Spend any time at all with Billy Crow, Ph.D., and it quickly becomes apparent that he has a genuine passion for his work.
For the past 17 years, Crow has been the University of Florida's turfgrass nematologist and extension specialist, and he doesn't just enjoy his work; he loves it. When he's discussing nematodes, or showing students or others how to find them under a microscope, his enthusiasm shows.In fact, Crow has such a zeal for what he does, his colleagues question whether it really qualifies as work at all.
"You can see it in his lectures. He is extremely passionate," said Travis Shaddox, Ph.D., assistant professor of turfgrass science and extension specialist at the university's Fort Lauderdale Research and Education Center.
"You can tell the man never works, because he's doing exactly what he loves every day."
A Florida native, Crow graduated from the University of Hawaii with a bachelor's degree in agriculture and initially had designs on a future that included researching nematodes in potatoes, not turf. That wasn't where the demand was when he started at UF in 2000.
Since then, Crow has become one of the world's foremost authorities on nematology, and turfgrass managers throughout Florida, across the country and around the globe have been recipients of that good fortune.
As its name implies, Old Marsh Golf Club in Palm Beach Gardens sits nestled in an area dominated by natural wetlands. Since Pete Dye carved it out of the landscape in 1987, Old Marsh gained a reputation as one of the most challenging layouts in Florida thanks largely to its natural surroundings.
That environment also presents some challenges, namely ensuring that all surface water drains either into canals or ponds and not the natural wetlands.
You can see it in his lectures. He is extremely passionate. . . . You can tell the man never works, because he's doing exactly what he loves every day."
The course went under the knife in 2016 for a major renovation by Chris Lutzke of Albanese & Lutzke to make sure it remained a relevant challenge to golfers and moved water as efficiently as possible. That included bringing in 3,700 dump trucks of fill and regrassing the fairways with Latitude 36 Bermudagrass, which is known for its drought tolerance.
While growing in the Latitude 36 last year, Old Marsh superintendent Tony Nysse noticed that the turf in some areas wasn't as healthy as it could be.
Samples submitted to Crow's lab in Gainesville confirmed the source of the problem.
"Our first instinct was nematodes, but before making any sort of applications, we decided to send samples to Dr. Crow and the University of Florida," Nysse said. "Our results came back confirming our thoughts - lance and sting nematodes over 500 and 100 (per cubic centimeter, respectively). This is way past the threshold of allowing for any grass to grow."
Crow established a control program that has helped the reworked Old Marsh get back to being as grueling and aesthetically pleasing as ever.
"We have so many different applications available at our fingertips to combat the onslaught of nematodes. As we try to always be good stewards of the land, to have the ability to have answers 24 to 48 hours after sending a soil sample to the University of Florida is vital to any superintendent's success in our state," Nysse said. "To have a professor of Dr. Crow's caliber, and his team, whose focus is nematodes, is a huge benefit to the Florida Golf Course Superintendents Association."
During a recent two-day Evidence-Based Turfgrass Management conference in Gainesville that focused on pest management, Crow showed professional turf managers how he and his team extract nematodes from soil samples for analysis and helped the group find the pests under a microscope, and more.
"The highlight, and everybody's been wanting to get to do this, is you guys are going to actually tease a female root knot nematode out of a Bermudagrass root," Crow said during the seminar. "How many of you have done that before. It's guaranteed to be something new."
Today, the UF nematology lab receives samples from near and far from turf managers and homeowners seeking help with the grass they manage.
"We get samples from all over," Crow said. "They're mostly from southern states, but we're increasingly getting them from Midwest and northern states as well. We just got a permit to get samples from Hawaii, and so we've started to get them from there over the past few months. We get them from California, Washington, all over."
As Nysse hinted, a team that specializes in turfgrass nematology makes the Florida lab unique. Crow's lab doesn't have a permit to receive live samples from out of the country, but he does accept those that have been preserved in a solution, which allows him to receive samples from places like China, Australia and South Africa.
"There are some good diagnostics labs in a lot of places, but not in every place, and not ones that specialize in turf diagnostics," he said. "Many nematode diagnostics labs will specialize in nematodes on tobacco, or potatoes or cotton. They don't really work with turf. That's where we can help."Crow was on the interview committee that hired entomologist Adam Dale, Ph.D., in 2016. Today, Dale considers Crow more than a colleague. He's a mentor, too.
"Having him as a resource to come to and ask questions has really been valuable to me from the beginning. From my interview until now," Dale said.
"He is the world's leading specialist in turfgrass nematodes. In turfgrass nematology there is one person people point to and that is Dr. Billy Crow."
Even colleagues seek out advice on such a specialized field.
"He's who I call if someone calls me about nematodes," Shaddox said. "I know the basics and can help direct them in the right direction, but if they need more detailed information , he's the specialist other faculty call. It's not just homeowners and turf managers, other faculty go to him as a resource."