Abstract
The colorant is one of the materials used to maintain the green color of turfgrass during the dormant period or to disguise the leaves discolored from pests or physiological damage in golf course. Because the colorant is sprayed with liquid on the golf courses, it can be stained on hands or shoes of turfgrass users after spraying. In this study, surfactants were evaluated on the creeping bentgrass putting green of the golf course to prevent the stain to the golfer's shoes or hands after spraying the colorant. The effect of colorant application time on the amount of colorant remaining in the putting green was evaluated. No physically problematic phenomena were found when the surfactants polyoxy ethylene alkylarylether+sodium ligno sulfonate, polyoxyethylene methylpolysiloxane, and siloxane were mixed with the colorant, respectively. Each of the three surfactant types was excellent in coloring effect when they mixed with the colorant on creeping bentgrass. When all three types of surfactants were treated at high concentrations, they tended to exhibit low values of residual colorant at the time when dew was present on the turfgrass next morning. The colorant left on the putting green was low in the siloxane treatment. The colorant added with siloxane had a high coloring effect in both the morning and afternoon treatments, but the amount of the colorant left on the creeping bentgrass the next morning was lower in the morning treatment. Both treatments had low residual chromaticity at high concentrations of the surfactant.
Figures & Tables
Fig. 1. Creeping bentgrass putting green for surfactant study. A: Field right after spraying colorant, B: Creeping bentgrass plants before and after colorant application (left: Before application, right: After application), C: Creeping bentgrass plants just after colorant application, D: Investigation of residual colorant amount using A4 paper next morning, E: Colorant absorbed by A4 paper, F: Colorant absorbed at the bottom of a shoe.
