DR. DENNIS MARTIN—THE OSU TURF RESEARCH PROGRAM’S BIG PICTURE GUY

establishment, maintenance and pest control practices on golf courses, sod farms, athletic fields and commercial grounds in Oklahoma. Delivery of turf extension programming information to commercial and professional turf managers through a state-wide turf conference, workshops, and printed and audio/visual media.”

He describes the “rest of his job” as “advising grad students” and “filling in holes and finding new opportunities here and there.” Obviously, he’s a big picture guy with the ability and flexibility to tackle multiple tasks effectively.

Turfgrass lawns are meant to support recreation and relaxation as Dr. Dennis Martin demonstrates here with Jackie Little Squirt. Photo by Karen Martin

By Suz Trusty

Practically anyone working with cold hardy turf-type bermudagrass has been impacted by the work of Dr. Dennis Martin. He joined the Horticulture and Landscape Architecture Department of Oklahoma State University (OSU) in September of 1990—26 years ago. His appointment now is very similar to what it was when he started: 75 percent extension and 25 percent research.

Most of Professor Martin’s field work is based at the Turf Research Center in Stillwater where his research activities include: “Evaluation of turf-type bermudagrasses, tall fescues, Kentucky bluegrasses, fine fescues, creeping bentgrasses, zoysiagrasses and buffalograsses for adaptation to Oklahoma and management of the National Turfgrass Evaluation Program (NTEP) trials. As part of the turfgrass team, he assists in the development of new seeded and vegetative propagated cold hardy bermudagrasses for sports turf, golf course fairways/tees and home lawns.”

He and his staff also are working on a large research and extension education project for the Oklahoma Department of Transportation (ODOT), conducting herbicide trials on the roadsides, assessing their roadside vegetation management programs, and assisting ODOT with their new monarch/pollinator habitat improvement program. His extension activities include: “Development of formal suggestions for turfgrass selection,

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As a youngster, Dennis Martin, like many of his childhood friends, operated a small, neighborhood mowing business. He recalls his favorite marketing phrase was “… and I will trim around the house, sidewalks and flower beds but I promise not to mow off your flowers.” As a teen he worked in baling hay and straw, hoeing out weeds from soybeans, and detasseling seed production field corn. In college he moved through forestry, greenhouse production, and nursery production before settling in on a turfgrass management specialization. While he enjoyed a golf course crew member internship between his junior and senior years, after a taste of turfgrass research gained through participating in his college’s first-ever, formalized undergraduate research scholarship, he was hooked on turfgrass science.

After earning his Bachelor’s degree in Ornamental Horticulture and his Masters and Ph.D. in Horticulture, all at the University of Illinois, he was eager to put his education to work and really looking forward to his supporting role on the turfgrass breeding and research team. “Ten months after I was hired, OSU lead turfgrass researcher, Dr. Joel Barber, left to work for Golf Enterprises,” says Martin. “I moved from the support position to the spotlight—basically taking over running the program, including the screening project for the bermudas, at the end of July in 1991.”

Tat made him the direct link to OSU turfgrass breeder/ geneticist Dr. Charles Taliaferro. Martin adds, “I really appreciate the opportunity to have worked with Dr. Taliaferro from my start time to his retirement in 2006. Everything the OSU program has accomplished in turfgrass breeding and research rests on the sound foundation of his vision and focus, beginning with his work on improved turf-type bermudagrasses in 1986. Te year 1986 was a big year for OSU. Our first USGA-funded bermudagrass development grant started and the first NTEP bermudagrass trial was planted at OSU that year.

TPI Turf News September/October 2016