Damage of new grass planted at the new Mt. Ararat High School baseball fields off Canam Drive means the fields won’t be ready for play in spring of 2020. (Darcie Moore / The Times Record)
TOPSHAM — As construction continues on the new Mt. Ararat High School, damaged grass on its new baseball fields may keep the fields closed next season.
District officials say it’s a case of winter kill, which refers to damage caused by ice, snow, mold or issues with the soil that prevent the newly seeded grass from growing or turning green in the spring. The architect filled district officials in on the problem during a meeting last week.
The architect told the school board in a memo that the baseball field should be closed until spring 2020 to give the grass a chance to recover.
The new school is scheduled to open in the fall of 2020 and then the current school will be torn down to make way for a competition field at the site. The entire $60.7 million project is slated to wrap up by the fall of 2021.
The plan was to have the new baseball fields ready for play by spring of 2019, but the grass hadn’t grown enough in time, forcing the baseball team to play on fields elsewhere, including Bowdoin College and Morse and Brunswick High Schools.
According to the architect, early snowfall during the fall of 2018 was followed by heavy rains and alternative freezing and thaw conditions throughout the winter. Those conditions are blamed for creating a layer of ice that starved the new grassroots of oxygen and killed the grass stalks.
The school district instructed the architect to do tests including soil samples and explain what lead to the winter kill.
According to the findings, the topsoil had a higher clay content than was approved for the project. The infield material also didn’t meet specifications and was too low in sand and high in clay and silt.
“These materials will have to either be replaced or remixed,” the memo states. “Deficiencies, however, or not the primary cause of the poor turf establishment which, unfortunately, is related to unusual fall and winter weather which the new grass could not withstand.”
The architect is funding the fixes. The school district hasn’t yet accepted ownership of the fields, which will have a one-year warranty.
Building Committee Chairman John Hodge Hodge said the high school athletics director plans to schedule games and practices at other locations, as the school did this past season year.
“At this point we’re trying to sit down with all the parties involved to discuss what are the issues affecting the fields and what needs to happen; and what is the timetable,” Hodge said.
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