Month: July 2023

Introducing Ezi Lawns

Ezi Lawns is a turf supplier based in Bordertown, South Australia, that specialises in supplying premium quality turf to homeowners, landscapers, and commercial developers. The company offers a wide variety of turf options to suit different applications, including Sir Walter DNA Certified Buffalo and TifTuf Hybrid Bermuda.

The business is relatively new and came about from an opportunity for growth as a Lawn Solutions Australia (LSA) member in South Australia. The team behind Ezi Lawns includes Owners Ashley Cook and Jenny Tilbrook, alongside Matthew and Kriena Rowett.

Ashley Cook was an oat miller who also worked in the family oat milling business, Blue Lake Milling, and did so for many years. Ashley moved from Mount Gambier to Bordertown when he left school. During Ashley’s time at Blue Lake Milling, Ashley learnt everything about making the best product for porridge possible and gained a strong knowledge of the production process. He was responsible for ensuring the production, packaging lines and infrastructure in the mill and facilities kept pace with the business as it grew both domestic and export markets. At the time the business was sold in 2015, it employed approximately 140 staff across 3 sites located in 3 states.

Ashley is passionate about producing quality products for a large market and doing this in the most efficient and cost-effective way possible. While not considered the conventional fit as a turf farmer, Ashley’s experience has proven to be instrumental in adapting and finding success within the new business. The team at Ezi Lawns jokes that Ashley’s favourite things in life are concrete and steel with all the construction projects he’s undertaken over the years, but a love for turf is quickly becoming a new favourite.

Jenny is a farmer’s daughter from a small town called Lake King in Western Australia. She completed a Bachelor of Accounting and Finance and worked in financial planning before joining Ashley at Blue Lake Milling. Jenny worked in the sales team where the markets included industrial, domestic, and export retail customers.

The time at Blue Lake Milling provided Ashley and Jenny with experience in building and maintaining long-term supply arrangements for a broad range of customers including the major supermarkets and multi-national food companies. As the company grew so did the systems which ensured compliance with food standards across multiple countries and markets. This included production quality controls to ensure products that would meet individual customer expectations while ensuring the operations were as cost-effective and efficient as possible.

Matthew Rowett is an accountant and financial planner and is the numbers man at Ezi Lawns. As a director of Ezi Lawns, Matt’s input on management systems and financial decisions is paramount with his many years of experience as an advisor for another turf business, Sunnyside Instant Lawn.

Kriena Rowett is the one who keeps everyone grounded and reminds the team of the importance of family. As a small family business, Kriena is crucial and is often the one who has all the kids when work commitments ramp up. Kriena always has a plan and healthy food on hand to help us work towards what we are trying to achieve. “We all need a mum in our lives to keep us on track and Kriena is that for all of us!” Jenny informed us.

Being in a business that grows something is exciting and tangible. There is the element of uncertainty of working with an agricultural product, but there is also the sense of achievement when you can consistently produce a product to the highest standard. The team at Ezi Lawns don’t shy away from hard work and all enjoy the opportunity to have a balance between the physical outdoors work on the product, but also working in and on the business.

There is still a demand for kikuyu in the region, but Ezi Lawns would like to encourage the market to move away from the kikuyu and adopt more environmentally sustainable varieties like TifTuf. Environmental sustainability is a passion for the business with improved production efficiencies and the development of new high-quality turf products for the market.

A new business is exciting and a little daunting at the same time. The benefit for Ezi Lawns is the opportunity to learn from other well-established businesses, taking things that work well and using their own experiences to implement new ways of doing things, the Ezi Lawns way.

Brighton Homes Arena – Springfield, QLD

The Australian rules football team, The Brisbane Lions, recently unveiled their new state-of-the-art facility, Brighton Homes Arena. The facility is the result of 10 years of planning which involved finding funding and partners to bring everything together into one modern and multi-functional site

Prior to this newly built facility, the Brisbane Loins used a range of venues around Brisbane including:

• Giffin Park, Coorparoo – Training Field
• The Gabba – Gym
• Nudgee College and QSAC stadium – Track
• Pre-season games in different venues around Brisbane

Brighton Homes Arena has a capacity of 8,000 spectators with the scope to expand on this in the coming years. The facilities for teams are unique in that the men’s and women’s facilities are identical, with equal gym, changing rooms, and office spaces to give both teams the same opportunities. This was really important for inclusivity with the new arena being home to the Brisbane Lions AFLW Team for both training and matches.

The Brighton Homes Arena playing surface covers 1.9 hectares and is built on a 280mm sand profile. AFL Queensland were the leading subcontractor on design of the oval and commissioned Labosport to do the specifications for the field and engaged Twin View Turf for field construction and Irri-Flow Contracting for the design and installation of the irrigation system.

The ground was specified with TifTuf Hybrid Bermuda turf to complete the project. TifTuf was introduced as a new and improved turf variety in recent years with superior drought tolerance, tensile strength and colour retention benefits the key reasons behind its selection.

The field and surrounds are managed by AFL Queensland, and the principal contractor for the construction was Hutchinson’s Builders. AFL Queensland is excited to have a newly developed hybrid bermuda grass on the oval, leading the way in innovation, and performance, plus it looks incredible. Chris Dalton has been employed by AFL Queensland as a Sports Turf Manager for the last 17 years, including time at Ashgrove and Nudgee Golf Clubs as well as the Gabba. Chris now oversees the new Brighton Homes Arena as well as other venues around Brisbane and the Gold Coast.

The Arena covers a broad home base for several teams, and the oval is used on average 12-18 hours per week for training.

• Brisbane Lions Men’s AFL training – 3 days per week
• Lions VFL – Training and playing, March to November
• Lions AFLW – Training and games, March to November
• Lions Academy program – Training and games plus community and open days

Field construction on the oval began in June 2022 and was completed on 14th October 2022, with the last roll of TifTuf turf laid. AFL Queensland took over maintenance of the field and 10 days later, the oval was aerated and top-dressed with 192 tonnes of topdressing. The first training season for the Lions AFLW team was on the 21st of November, and on Sunday 26th of November, the Grand Final of the AFLW competition was played at the new Arena.

The turf is cut at 16mm and water harvesting is undertaken from a 4,800lt under-field tank from drainage water and pumped into a 300,000lt main irrigation holding tank. The end of January 2023 saw the oval scarified again and top-dressed with 64 tonnes of topdressing. A pre-season AFL game was played on 3rd March 2023, with the Brisbane Lions facing off against Geelong.

This new arena has given the Brisbane Lions, both men and women a home base with a world-class facility all on one site.

By Ben Sims

I started in the turf industry when I was 20 years old, and I worked on a golf course for eight years in a country town in NSW called Orange. I was fortunate enough to have a lot of experience with different grass cultivars and had the opportunity to not only work on a golf course with bent grass greens but also on a hybrid couch bowling green.

As soon as I finished my apprenticeship my passion for turf increased dramatically and I was addicted to researching and learning as much as I could. I would read every article I could find online, and I bought multiple books to help increase my knowledge and understanding.

This love for turf then sparked a passion to teach others how to look after their own lawns which is what ultimately pushed me to start my YouTube channel, Lawn Tips. I uploaded my first video on the 25^th of May 2017. My goal was to upload a video once a week consistently and give people not only “Lawn Tips” but provide entertainment as well. Two years later I quit my job on the golf course and went into a full-time Job on YouTube talking about grass.

In the second year of my apprenticeship, I had started to dream of owning and building my own golf course but had always thought that was a little farfetched and impossible. Fast forward to the present day and my dream has become a reality!

The Par 3 Project

My wife and I purchased a 12-acre property in 2021 and the Par 3 project was born!

Taking on this Par 3 build has presented many challenges and I have learnt so much more than I had ever expected to.

The first hurdle was making sure we had sufficient water to water the green, fairways and tees. We only have rainwater storage on the property and no access to town water. I was told that people who sunk bores in our area had very little flow and a minimal chance of water, but I decided to take the risk and sink a bore on the property. If you’ve ever sunk a bore before you know how risky it really is. You could be $30k out of pocket with a 200m hole in the ground with no water to show for it. Thankfully we found water at about 60m underground and had a flow of 500 gallons/hour which was enough to fill up some water storage tanks to then pump some water onto the course.

The build officially started on the 4^th of September after nearly 12 months of rain delays.

The Subgrade

The first step in building a golf green is building the foundation which is known as the subgrade. This is where the levels of the final grade of the green are determined. This was by far the most difficult part of the whole process due to constant revisions on the final shape and undulations on my green. The final size of the green I shaped is 500m2 (the subgrade doesn’t have to mirror the finished grade but it’s important to get as close as possible to prevent movement in material and levels over time).

Subsurface Drainage

The next step is the subsurface drainage which is designed to help move excess water from the profile, so the green is playable even after heavy storms. 100mm ag pipe was used in a herringbone pattern to collect as much water as possible. 200m of pipe was used over the whole of the green surface.

The Gravel Layer

The gravel layer is also used to remove excess water from the green surface and help to prevent the sand from clogging up the drainage. The gravel also creates a perched or suspended water table in the sand, increasing its ability to retain nutrients and moisture. The gravel layer should be within 1 inch of the final grade of the green surface (100 tonnes of gravel was used at 100mm in thickness).

The Sand Layer

The sand layer is what the bent grass is established on. Golf greens are built with sand to help move water, allow more traffic, and promote a stronger, more dense root system.

The sand is 300mm thick which equates to about 260 tonnes of sand. I spent 3 weeks shaping, watering, and compacting the sand so it was ready for grass. This can be done in 2-3 days, but I sowed my surrounds during this time to prevent soil eroding onto the green itself.

Sowing The Green

On the 23^rd of February, I sowed the bent grass into the sand. I watered the seed 4 times a day to help with germination and by day 6 the seed had germinated. The green was then mowed on day 14 and would be mowed every 2-3 days for the next 4 weeks.

At the 6-week mark, I start to mow daily, and liquid fertilisers are applied weekly to help promote growth and build up nutrients in the sand profile. At the time of writing this article (1^st of May), the green is 11 weeks old and is nearly filled in.

Next Steps…

Now that the green is built it’s time to start working on fairways and tee boxes.

This will include irrigation installation, shaping fairways and building elevated tee boxes.

Grass Selection

 To help save water on the course I have decided to select warm season grasses for the fairways. For the larger fairway, I have selected TifTuf Hybrid Bermuda. It’s a great grass for the climate here with its superior drought tolerance and ability to hold good colour leading into the cooler months.

For the Fairway toward the back of the paddock, I have decided to go with some Sir Grange Zoysia. I’m excited to try some zoysia out on the property as I don’t have a lot of experience with it. Sir Grange Zoysia was specifically bred for the golf industry, it’s very versatile and is used on some of the best courses in the world, so it’s pretty cool to have here in Orange.

I’m still undecided on the grass types for my tee boxes, but they will be warm season grass again to help with water. I’m leaning towards a hybrid couch due to quicker repair rates with divots and traffic. I look forward to providing an update as the build progresses further towards the end of the year.