A robotic fox has been busy this spring in Kamloops, B.C., chasing flocks of geese from the city's prized sports fields. Geese populations have increased significantly over the past decade, damaging the fields. "We’ve got high standards for our sports fields and you have goose crap everywhere," parks supervisor Shawn Cook said.

The prolonged winter in parts of Alberta has some Calgary landscapers concerned about their bottom line. At least one local landscaper charges his customers for sidewalk snow clearing with a seasonal flat rate that covers the cost of about 35 clearings. This year there have been 60 clearings with likely more to come.

Tick season is underway for another year in British Columbia's Okanagan region. Ticks become active when temperatures reach about minus 4 degrees Celsius.

Tuesday night's pre-season Major League Baseball game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Los Angeles Angels was called in the fifth inning due to.... a sewage leak in front of the Dodgers' dugout. In what may have been a baseball first, a watermain leak left a large brown pool of foul-smelling sewage that forced cancellation of the game.

In an effort to lighten its footprint in sensitive wetlands and marshy areas in Montreal's Mount Royal Park, the city has gone back to a practice of yesteryear to remove trees infected by the emerald ash borer. Two Belgian draught horses are being used this week to haul infected trees from the woods, negating the possibility of gasoline or oil spills related to machinery.

A 48-year-old man has been given his old job back as a Chicago White Sox groundskeeper after having spent the past 23 years in jail for a crime he didn't commit.

Every day we benefit greatly from the precision achieved when professionals use tools designed specifically for their jobs. Surgery, for instance, would be far more risky and leave less than ideal results if surgeons did not have some of the sharpest scalpels in the world that allow them to work with extreme precision.

As a means of promoting a more sustainable use of water, a Spanish university has developed a 100 per cent maintenance-free smart irrigation system that saves up to 60 per cent water and can be controlled by a simple smart phone or tablet.

Rivershore Golf Links opens for play today, making it the first Kamloops, B.C. course to open for the season. Most other area courses are still awaiting additional snow melt before they open for play.

A half-million-dollar upgrade to North Bay, Ont.'s Veterans Field will allow the city to host major baseball tournaments in the future. A major component of the project will be the installation of an artificial turf infield that will lengthen the playing season and reduce the amount of maintenance required.

Golf season in the Okanagan region of British Columbia typically gets underway in early to mid-February, but an unco-operative winter has delayed most course openings. Those that have recently opened offered playing conditions that impressed golfers. (Be sure to scroll down past first story after clicking link.)

Several of British Columbia's west coast golf courses have made tremendous strides over the past decade in their reduction of pesticide usage. Cultivating healthier grass to outcompete moss and other pests has become the focus for these superintendents.

Spring is on its way and there will be plenty of work involved with opening your client irrigation systems. This checklist will help you and your staff to complete each opening in detail so that unnecessary callbacks are kept to a minimum. There will be additions and/or deletions as sites vary.

When overseeding athletic fields, sports turf managers have a number of options as to the varieties and species from which to choose, with the objective being to achieve a safe playing surface.

In some municipalities, sports turf managers work with separate budgets for irrigation and drainage, but it’s not always the best approach, claims an associate professor of turfgrass science at the University of Guelph.

Oak wilt, poised to destroy tens of thousands of Windsor, Ont.'s oak trees, is on the verge of arriving in Canada. The serious vascular disease has already been confirmed on Belle Island in Michigan where it has infected 112 trees. The island is only 600 metres from Windsor.

Katie Dodson grew up in golf course management. Her father and grandfather, two uncles and a brother all are – or were – golf course superintendents, and she herself was an assistant superintendent (in Whitehorse) before switching to the research side almost 15 years ago.

Dollar spot is typically the No. 1 disease facing golf course superintendents each year, and it’s one that was misunderstood for decades. “For about 30 years, folks were trying to figure out what this fungus was,” Richard Buckley, director of the plant diagnostics lab at Rutgers University in New Jersey, said in July.

When a sports field needs a season-ending overhaul, a number of things can be done to have it ready for play the following spring. It can be aerated to relieve compaction, overseeded to re-establish turf in worn areas or even sodded in such high-traffic areas as goalmouths and the field’s centre.

When turfgrass experiences a problem, it typically turns a shade of yellow, tan or brown, no matter if the culprit is a disease or insect, making it difficult to accurately diagnose. Lawn care professionals must therefore gather as much information as possible to determine the exact cause of the problem, former turfgrass extension specialist Pam Charbonneau said.

Growing new trees in Sault Ste. Marie is a difficult process, the president of Tree Canada says, which makes it all the more important to protect the trees that currently exist in the city. Cold temperatures, abundant road salt and few species to choose from inhibit the growth rate, Mike Rosen said.

Now is the best time of year to lay sod, says Home Hardware lawn and garden expert Mark Cullen. Cooler soil, cooler evenings and heavy morning dew are all contributing factors toward making this the ideal time for sodding, he says.

Plans to build two new artificial turf fields at Chapples Park in Thunder Bay, Ont. have been scrapped because federal funding has yet to be approved. Instead, the city will earmark its budgeted $1.25 million and rebuild its premier field on the site.

A new set of recommendations has been approved for user groups of sports fields and other facilities to abide by in Summerside, P.E.I. The updated recommendations include working with turf field users to determine contributions each group will pay toward a turf field improvement fund.

A $3.4-million project to build four identical baseball diamonds at a complex in Rocky View County in Alberta is on track to meet its fundraising goals, the municipality's policies and procedures committee has been told. The goal is to open the facility in the fall of 2019.

The City of Penticton, B.C. is asking its residents to cease operating their irrigation systems for the better part of the next two weeks during the connection of a new water supply pipe. Residents are being encouraged to adopt other water-saving measures during this period.

Grass clippings will continue to be collected at curbside this summer in Edmonton, but it's the city's goal to phase out the operation to combat a landfill overflow. The city hopes to end the practice, as well as the collection of general yard waste, by September.

A backlash of criticim has arisen in the aftermath of Wednesday's city council meeting in Vancouver during which Mayor Gregor Robertson initiated a motion for parks board staff to consider turning part of Langara Golf Course into parkland. What was supposed to be on the table that night was a motion to look into upgrading the golf course's drainage system.

Plans to pave paradise and put up a parking lot have riled up students and parents at a Victoria, B.C. elementary school. A grass field that served as a play area for students will be paved to accommodate more parking at the school, leaving parents concerned for their children's safety.

Work to install new irrigation at two Calgary ball diamonds has thrown a curve at a local little league. Thirteen-to-18-year-olds playing in the Bow Ridge Little League will have to look elsewhere for a place to play as the diamonds will be out of commission to accommodate the irrigation work. "We'll literally have to tell these guys, sorry, we can't field a team this year," the league's vice-president says.

Tempers got short during Wednesday's meeting of Vancouver City Council when a discussion about drainage at the Langara Golf Course unexpectedly changed direction into one that explored turning part of the property into a park. Langara, the oldest public golf course in British Columbia, accounts for about 25 per cent of the parks board's annual revenue.

As Sarnia, Ont. braces for the inevitable arrival of oak wilt from Michigan, the municipality is asking its residents to help mitigate and stall the beetle-borne disease's progress.

New turf and the addition of more trees are among the improvements to be made at Toronto's Queen's Park. The north end of the park is closing from March until October to accommodate revitalization work. The south end will be shut down for improvements during the same time period next year.

Syngenta's new Instrata II® fungicide combines the forces of two powerful active ingredients, providing long-lasting control of snow mould during the winter months. One case of Instrata II covers six acres.

The Bannerman/Re-Mac Debris & Stone Burier is designed to cultivate, grate, and bury stones as well as debris, leaving behind a leveled blanket of fine soil.

"Alexa, start the Automower." Husqvarna, manufacturer of the robotic Automower, has made its product compatible with the cloud-based voice service Alexa, allowing the Automower to start, stop, park and produce status updates by "asking Alexa."

Toro's new Outcross 9060 has the benefits of both a tractor and super-duty utility vehicle. The machine allows superintendents and turfgrass professionals to do more with less, using less labour, fewer resources and taking less time.

Bridge approach settlements can cause unsafe walking and cycling conditions, poor public perception, potential structural failure of bridges and long-term maintenance costs.

A new self-propelled, hybrid turf mower has been introduced to the sod growing market, enabling fast, precision cutting and decreasing the average cost per acre.

Outdoor power products manufacturer Husqvarna has reformulated its machine oils to set new standards in performance and product longevity. The improved formulations deliver low operating temperatures and greater detergency inside engines. The new bar and chain oil range offers reduced friction and wear on cutting equipment.

Grasshopper's new FrontMount Model 900D 1.3L mower is equipped with a Tier 4 final-compliant, fuel-efficient and powerful 1.3L MaxTorque diesel engine that requires no power robbing after-treatment systems.

Civitas Turf Defense is a registered plant protection, fungicide and insecticide product with an innovative ability to increase turf stress tolerance capabilities. Formulated with superior actives andproven through countless university research trials, the product primes turf to prevent damage from biotic and abiotic stresses before they would normally occur.

Save time and increase productivity when burying wire around the yard with the Perimeter Wire Machine PWM600MH from Portable Winch, available in Canada from Rittenhouse in St. Catharines, Ont.

Land Pride's RC37 Series folding rotary cutters are available in widths of 12 and 15 feet and feature a three-inch cutting capacity with a cut height of 1.5 inches to 14 inches.