Dal professor knows his turf
West Hants native is head agronomist advisor for Wanderers Grounds
HALIFAX, N.S. – Dr. Robert Daniels has struck a pitch-perfect note with the HFX Wanderers.
In their inaugural premier soccer league season, players are singing Daniels's praises for his work underfoot.
“The players will tell you that it’s the best in its league,” he said. “We had to take the design to the next level because professional sport is under so much scrutiny.”
A West Hants native, Daniels is semiretired. He served as a professor of turf grass at Dalhousie's School of Agriculture in Bible Hill most of his career.
These days his feet are firmly planted on the ground. He is head agronomist advisor and helped design and build the Wanderers Grounds playing surface in Halifax.
The natural soccer pitch is garnering adulation as the best in the league. Daniels says the secret is the sand-based media and its drainage and irrigation system that ensures the grass maintains the optimal level of moisture. This ensures a premium playing field, with a more durable surface that stands up to wear and keeps maintenance costs down.
“The true measure of the field is how well the ball rolls,” he said. “If the field is too dry, the ball will bounce… too wet, it slows it down.”
The natural, sand-based field was designed to facilitate professional level soccer and rugby play, while meeting all FIFA specifications.
The turf, a mixture of Kentucky Bluegrass sod and soil, uses water efficiently so as to be environmentally responsible.
Wanderers Grounds in Halifax is the latest of Daniels’s projects. He’s designed other fields in the Maritimes, including those at Mount Allison University in Sackville, N.B., and St. Francis Xavier in Antigonish. There’s also an Olympic-level field at the Stadium in Moncton that hosted the World Junior Track and Field championships in 2010.
Daniels is the only Canadian to hold a PHD in Turfgrass Science. This program combines the study of grasses, soils, water and pests to produce and maintain grasses for various purposes.
Being from Hants County, he was surrounded by fields but was inspired to work the land in a different way.
“I grew up in Windsor Forks and didn’t want to be a farmer,” he said. “My mother, who was a teacher, encouraged me to continue my education.”
He took her advice and went on to attend universities in Ontario and Montreal, eventually earning his PHD in turfgrass management in the U.S. before returning to teach at the Bible Hill institution.
In 2017, the Halifax Regional Municipality approved construction of a stadium to host a professional soccer team. This project revamped the Wanderers Grounds of the Halifax Commons.
Daniels feels fortunate to be with a great team that’s produced such an impressive field.
“It’s been beyond everyone’s expectations,” he said. “The stadium holds 6,000 people and so far, it has sold out at every game.”