I gave two lectures at Chiba University this week, one on Ten Things Every Horticulturist Should Know About Turfgrass, and another on Turfgrass Selection and Management in Asia. These lectures were for Masters and Doctoral students in the graduate school of Horticulture.

It is a great time of year to be at Japan, and it is always fun to speak with students about turfgrass. Chiba University has an innovative expert program within the Graduate School of Horticulture and attracts students from Japan, Europe, Africa, and many countries in Asia. The students in my lectures were from Vietnam, Uganda, India, Cambodia, Thailand, Japan, Germany, China —that is what I recall!

Most of my seminars are for professional turfgrass managers, but it is fun to speak with students at the university. In 2009 I spoke at seminars at University of the Philippines Los Baños and at National University of Singapore. Next March I have a seminar at University of Tennessee, and hopefully there will continue to be opportunities to speak with students at universities in Asia. As I mentioned to the students at Chiba University last week, Asia is a particularly difficult part of the world to grow grass, because of the climate, and the thousands of jobs in the turfgrass industry across Asia require people with a good technical understanding of turfgrasses and their management.