Within the Leather by Jamie Bezanson, Superintendent Oneka Ridge GC
What’s in your Salad? Contrary to the title, I am not writing about fruits, vegetables and their importance to your health. Personally, I should eat more of both and probably could improve my diet, but I don’t want to bore you all with the importance of eating your veggies. Salads, like our profession as golf course Superintendents, have many different combinations of things that make them great or terrible. That is what’s unique about our profession; everyone does things a little different to get a similar result. The geography always differs and we may use different equipment, fertilizers, chemicals, personnel and practices, but we PagePage 62
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end up with a property that is used to play a game with the same set of rules from one golf course to the next. We are challenged every day to wear many hats as Superintendents, from psychologists, to biologists and everything in between. I suppose that’s what has attracted me to this field. At any moment of the day we could be an agronomist, an entomologist, chemist, plumber, electrician, mechanic, meteorologist, environmentalist, an accountant and probably most importantly: a salesman. There is never a dull moment and I’m never bored at work, always looking for the opportunity to solve challenges from one day to the next. The varied responsibilities of the