XGD Fairway Drainage Results

We received  this video yesterday from superintendent Jim Colo from the ultra-exclusive Alotian Club near Little Rock, Arkansas. It is pretty well self explanatory:

Matt Magarian and his crew, just arrived here a few weeks ago after being frozen out up in Chicagoland. The fairways at Alotian are zoysia and that explains the dormant look. In these particular heavy clay soil conditions, we chose to use an 8′ spacing for our 2″ XGD laterals, installed at a minimum depth of 16″, and back filled with a free draining sand percing at about 18″/hour, with sod lift and relay. The only thing left do at this point is to install some rodent guard protection at the outlet pipe to ensure the long term success of the drainage system.

This internal subsurface drainage system’s main thrust is to remove the useless gravitational groundwater, which in turn lowers the groundwater table, allowing for movement of surface water into the subsoil and in to the soil between our laterals, and ultimately in to the XGD drainage lateral from the bottom up, not from the top down. This simple drainage theory allows us to return the sod over top of the XGD laterals, and we don’t get caught up in impeding surface water flow, by reinstalling the sod folks, again, groundwater drainage is bottom up and not top down, despite what you may believe, or learned in turf school. I will quantify that statement by acknowledging that fairway drainage systems with solid pipe and surface inlets and/or catch basins installed in hollows or low spots is top down drainage. But, that has produced some of the problems they are experiencing at Alotian, and we have been contracted to supplement this type of “top down” drainage with our XGD System. We are also pulling out several catch basins, and perforating them and back filling around them with pea stone to alleviate the soggy conditions immediately around these basins, caused by the trapped groundwater.

Matt will be returning in the new year to complete the rest of this winter project, with the scope of work including over 20,000 lineal feet of 2″ XGD, and some 4″ interceptors and mainlines, with some catch basin repair and enhancement.

So please reach out to us so we might be able to help you bring your fairways up another notch, and help provide those firm, fast, sustainable turf conditions, that ultimately will require less inputs in the future.

Bye for now, Poor Old Dirt & Grass Farmer