Doug Brede has had a lifelong interest in lowering maintenance, starting with his first job as a teenager, mowing yards for spending money. "I think it was all those trips back and forth to the clippings pile at Mrs. Fernstead's house that first convinced me there's got to be an easier way to do the things we do," he says, referring to one of his early lawn care clients (see introduction to Chapter 9).
Brede attended Penn State University as an agronomy major, discovering turf management as a career during his sophomore year. He spent summers during college maintaining a 2-hoe golf course. (The other 16 holes were under construction.) "I did it single-handedly and without a lot of equipment. That's probably where I acquired my experience at improvising," he says.
After graduation, Brede worked as an assistant superintendent for Valley Brook Country Club, a 27-hole course south of Pittsburgh, PA. He discusses some of his learning experiences as an assistant superintendent in Chapters 6 and 10. While at the course, he became interested in turf research, putting out plot trails on the fairways and greens.
After two years at the golf course, he reenrolled at Penn State University to pursue an MS and Ph.D. degree under the direction of Joe Duich, a leading turfgrass expert and breeder of the Penn-series of grasses. Brede's thesis projects dealt with turf establishment and grass seed mixtures. He worked half-time during school, planting, harvesting, and rating the breeding plots at Penn State.
After graduation in 1982, Brede took a job as an assistant at Oklahoma State University, replacing Wayne Huffine, a noted roadside turf researcher. He continued two of Huffine's long-term grants on roadside research, as well as pursuing a variety of interests on fine turf. He was awarded tenure and promoted to associate professor after four years. Shortly after that, he took the job of research director at Simplot Turf & Horticulture in Post Falls, ID, where he works today.
Brede's research department has released over 50 improved cultivars of Kentucky bluegrass, creeping bentgrass, tall fescue, fine fescue, perennial ryegrass, zoysiagrass, and bernudagrass. He has personally developed the PVP patents on many of these varieties, and holds utility patents in plant breeding. Brede breeds the bluegrasses and bentgrasses himself, and supervises two breeders for the other species. His grasses have been planted in more that 50 countries worldwide. Brede is a popular speaker at turf conferences, and was the organizer of the first turf conference in the Peoples Republic of China in 1990.
Brede currently serves as associate editor for Agronomy Journal, the most widely circulated periodical in the agronomic sciences. He has published over 100 articles in journal and popular trade magazines on turf and related subjects. He has served on research committees for the Golf Course Superintendents Association, the Lawn Institute, the Turfgrass Breeders Association, the National Turfgrass Evaluation Program, the National Grass Variety Review Board, the Idaho State Grasscycling Board, and the Crop Science of Agronomy.
Brede lives with his wife, Linda, and children, Lori, Amanda, and Michael, in their home in Washington State.
"I want to stress that the story of low maintenance turf does not end here," he says. "If you have ideas, tips, suggestions for new maintenance-saving ideas, please write to me and let me know. Brede can be contacted by email at [email protected] or at his office at W. 5300 Riverbend Avenue, Post Falls, ID 83854.