Groundsmen from independent schools across the country recently visited Haberdasher's Aske's Boy's School in Hertfordshire to attend the annual turf care seminar staged specifically for the sector by ICL.

Delegates were welcomed to Haberdashers by grounds manager Mike Kemmett who leads a team of 8 groundstaff maintaining the extensive sporting facilities of three cricket pitches as well as 12 rugby/football pitches, two all-weather hockey pitches, three artificial cricket pitches as well as indoor cricket, swimming and athletic facilities.

Emma Kilby, ICL Area Sales Manager for the Midlands and West, who organised and ran the event for the fourth year running began the seminar with an outline of the day before handing over to grounds manager Mike Kemmett to give an insight into the school’s sports facilities and his daily routines.

Henry Bechelet, ICL’s Technical Sales Manager was next, giving an informative and entertaining presentation on ‘sports pitch renovation tactics’ and the importance of nutrition including using the correct products, applying at the right rates and at the right time before also speaking about the company's commissioning of STRI trials where he revealed that the results conclusively showed that preventative usage is far more effective than curative.

Simon Hedley, managing director of Boughton Loam, took to the stage next to discuss cricket loams and the manufacturing processes involved in the company producing over 150,000 bags of dressing annually.

This was followed by Nick Martin, ICL Technical Area Sales Manager for the South West and West London, who gave a presentation on cricket table renovation, establishment and maintenance fertilizing.

Concluding the morning session, Dan Lightfoot, Syngenta’s business manager, gave an illustrated talk on the challenges of moving from summer to winter sports and the effects of wetting agents, and in particular the germination success of using Qualibra – the wetting and water conservation agent.

After lunch, delegates were split into two groups before being given a tour of the school grounds by Mike Kemmett and John Lewis who will be taking over the grounds manager position shortly. As well as getting a close look at impressive sporting facilities on offer at this prestigious school, they were also shown some of the turf maintenance machinery.

Commenting on the successful educational day, Lee Marshallsay, grounds manager at Charterhouse School, said: "I think these events are a great way to get school groundsmen together because we just wouldn’t get the chance otherwise. Visiting other schools gives us the opportunity to understand that we often have similar problems, you get to see other schools’ facilities and take some new ideas back with you. I think that the speakers have been excellent and they seem to improve each year. Of particular interest to me was seeing the results of the Primo Maxx trials and the talk on loam gave great insight into choosing the correct product.”