How do they create patterns in a baseball field?

Both my 7 year old son and 5 year old daughter wanted to know if I could cut our lawn like they did on the baseball field on TV, so I said, "sure I can, I'll do it this weekend." Then I thought to myself, “I have no idea how to do that.” So I did a bit of poking around. (I guess I could have asked Dr. Roto but I thought I could handle this one by myself.)

You probably know this already, but before I looked into it, I didn’t. Does that make me a moron? Well maybe, but I didn’t want my children to know that so I had to find out. If you’re a smart-aleck and already know then skip to the next post. If you are a moron like me, read on and I’ll learn-ya something.

Groundskeepers at baseball parks have traditionally created checkerboard, diamond and argyle patterns in the field. These patterns have become more elaborate in recent years. These designs are not all that complicated and can be easily duplicated on your own lawn.

The designs are created through a process called lawn striping. To create lawn-striping designs of your own, you only need two pieces of equipment: a lawnmower and a roller. Many professional groundskeepers use old-fashioned reel mowers to cut a stadium's grass. Attached just behind the blades of the mower is a lawn roller that bends the grass down. Some lawnmower manufacturers are beginning to make riding mowers with full-width rollers mounted to the rear of the mower to make this task easier.

Whatever pattern you make is revealed by the light shining off of the bent grass. A checkerboard design is created by passing over the grass in side-by-side rows, first going north to south, then making east-to-west stripes in the grass that intersect the north-south stripes. In this way, you alternate the way the grass bends. When you look at your lawn, the stripes of grass leaning away from you will look lighter. This lighter green is caused by the sunlight reflecting off the entire blade of grass. In the darker green stripes, formed by the blades of grass leaning toward you, the sunlight is reflecting only off the tips of the blades.

Different grasses can be used to accentuate the striping effect, including rye grass, fescue and bluegrass. You won't see such a big contrast between the stripes' colors if you have a warm-season grass, such as Bermuda or zoysia. Watering the grass after mowing can make your pattern stand out even more. - Peter Costa

Pete is a serious Rotisserie participant playing the same league with the same guys for 17 years. Not only has Peter never finished in the money; he’s finished last 13 times and no higher than 10th (in a league with 14 guys). Join us in following Peter’s trials, tribulations and frustrations, as he attempts to navigate his way out of the basement in 2009.