Dennis & SISIS round-up successful season of seminars

By Alistair July 2, 2019 19:08 Updated

Dennis and SISIS have completed another successful season of insightful seminars which welcomed over 500 attendees at various venues throughout the UK.

Dennis and SISIS have, for a number of years, hosted free-to-attend educational seminars designed to educate groundstaff on a variety of topics associated with sports turf maintenance. High quality speakers and interesting subjects have ensured these seminars have a reputation as ‘must-attend’ events with groundstaff travelling considerable distances to be in attendance.

While the seminars continue to go from strength to strength, Dennis and SISIS continue to evolve the seminars with the people of the industry in mind, and this year, the British manufacturers launched a new multi-sport groundcare seminar which featured a number of high quality speakers discussing subjects such as renovations, sports-turf construction, drainage, winter sports pitches and the future of groundcare maintenance.

This new event, which took place at St. Albans School, Woollam Trust Playing Fields, saw an incredible 220 delegates in attendance and attracted grounds staff from all over the UK including volunteers and professionals representing schools, sports clubs, local authorities and contractors.

Nick Lockhart, cricket professional and head of grounds and gardens at Felsted School in Essex, attended the event and claimed that the Dennis and SISIS seminars are essential for anyone who wants to take their sports surfaces to the next level.

“It has been thoroughly enjoyable, informative and thought provoking,” he said. “I would go as far as saying that it is a must-attend event for people in this industry. It has been incredibly interesting listening to all of the speakers who have all raised great points that we can take away with us and put into practice. Speakers aside, the networking opportunities are also important because it gives us a chance to speak to other delegates, find out what they might be doing differently to us and hopefully learn from them too.”

The ever popular Dennis and SISIS bowls seminars, which have been credited for improving the greens at numerous bowls clubs throughout the country, offered tips on topics such as early spring maintenance of bowling greens, grant funding support, and choosing the correct grass seed, chemicals and fertilizers.

Kev Brazier, a contract greenkeeper working in partnership with Harpenden Bowls Club, attended the seminar at the Herts Bowling Club in Watford and felt that it was a great opportunity to enhance his greenkeeping knowledge.

“It was an excellent and really informative seminar,” he said. “The speakers had great knowledge and they presented it in a way in which everyone could understand. It was great for networking and there was a broad range of subjects. They were all incredibly relevant and I took a lot away from seminar.”

As well as hosting their own events, Dennis and SISIS are committed to supporting sports turf education wherever possible and this year they also offered their expertise at eight Rugby Football Union (RFU) pitch maintenance seminars.