Aeration

 Aerating 9 Fairway

On Monday and Tuesday we were able to aerate all our fairways. Throughout the remainder of the week, we have been doing extra clean-up around the edges, giving the fairways a cut, filling areas with divot mix and adding extra water to help in recovery. This is a process that we like to do when the grass is actively growing so recovery time is minimal. As well, the warm and dry weather helps with our clean up and in the summer we have our highest number of staff to assist with the process. We attempt to get them done over a few days so that disruption to golf doesn’t drag on.

Clean up of Aeration

Our next small tine greens aeration will be on August 24th. This will set up the greens for a busy September with hopefully some great weather. We have decided on a 5-7 week rotation of greens aeration because of the results we have seen in the past. The many benefits include a healthy stand of turf on our greens, effective fertilizer and chemical applications, controlled thatch levels and effective infiltration rates of water during irrigation and rain events. The smaller tines are less disruptive so healing time is minimal. If we leave the greens to long without the aeration they are less responsive and become sealed on top. Gases buildup under the surface that need to be vented on a regular basis.

Due to the age of our greens we remove the cores and back fill with sand. This will modify the top of the soil profile helping with infiltration of water and firming up the surface.

Take a moment and click on the links below that discuss aeration.
 http://tinyurl.com/o78fftc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=863Ix8czcoY

Also look at Core Aeration by the Numbers. This will help explain what our goal is and how we came about putting our program together. We are using ¼” tines at 1.5” x 1.5” spacing (similar to 1” x 2” on articles chart). We are getting close to the 20% that they discuss. If we where to limit the amount of times we aerate we would need to increase the size of our tines and would therefore increase recovery time.

Our tentative schedule for the remainder of the season is as follows,

• August 24^th, Small Tine Greens Aeration
• Early October, Small Tine Greens Aeration
• October, Tee Aeration
• End of season, Deep Tine Aeration
• End of season, Mid Size Tine Aeration (If needed)

Surviving July and Easing into August

The end of July was hot and humid sending the golf course into survival mode as indicated by some off color grass and thinned out areas. The lack of rain during this time has really dried out the turf, but with irrigation and selective hand watering, we were able to keep the necessary areas alive. We have been taking it easy on our greens as much as possible to alleviate unnecessary stress on them. Our cultural practices have been kept at a minimum for this reason.

Irrigation on #8 Fairway

Hand Watering on #18 Green

The beginning of August has been a breath of fresh air. Cooler temperatures both day and night, lower humidity, plenty of sunshine and a couple of rain episodes. This has allowed the turf to come out of survival mode to begin recovery. We have been able to push the greens more and resume our cultural practices such as verticutting with a heavier topdressing. With fairway aeration approaching, the fairways should be healthy going into it and make for a quick recovery if the weather cooperates next week.

#4 Green Site

July Update

The next two weeks look like the longest warm/dry weather we may have this season. Over this time period we will be taking it easy on the turf, trying not to add too much extra stress. We will cut or roll the greens on a daily basis but not both. Also we will back off on our cultural programs of topdressing and verticutting until these extra heat stresses cool down. We will be hand watering greens as much as they need it so that we are only watering what is needed.

Morning sun at this time of year is very important for turf recovery. It is usually cool enough that photosynthesis is occurring compared to the heat of the day when the plant will shut down for survival. There are select areas on our greens that have little or restricted light in the morning and are therefore more stressed. We will be making sure these areas have the appropriate amounts of water, fertilizer and chemical to help fight off diseases. As the season progresses they will become stronger again and will be prepared for some good fall golf. 

#2 Green Early Morning

#10 Green Early Morning

In inspecting our green sites, our plan moving forward is to selectively prune and remove specific trees continuing this fall to help improve sunlight and air flow.

Dollar Spot

With the excess moisture and humidity over the last few weeks, we have seen some Dollar Spot on some tees and the fairways. A week ago we sprayed a control product on all the greens, two tee decks and 6 fairways. We have been monitoring the rest and are ready to spray the remainder if needed. Culturally we have aerated select tees that we feel are most susceptible and applied a low rate of fertilizer to help the turfgrass naturally fight off the disease. Luckily for us, the rain events have slowed down and we have had some cooler temperatures so the disease has not progressed. Usually by this time in the season we have sprayed all the greens, tees and fairways for Dollar Spot which is the most common disease of cool season turfgrass.

 Dollar Spot on #15 Fairway

As part of our tee renovation projects we have been converting our tees to Dwarf Bluegrass. This grass is less susceptible to Dollar Spot and we have not been able to find any disease on these tees at this time. We now have 25% of our tees converted and plan to do more in the future.

Dwarf Bluegrass 

Dwarf Bluegrass on #9 tee

Wet Week

The weather has took a wet turn this week receiving around 2 inches of rain total.

Standing water on 17 Green

 The positive from this is the golf course has greened up and we have been able to turn off the irrigation system for a few days. The unfortunate result is less golfer traffic and the excess moisture bringing on turf diseases. Today we have seen our first Dollar Spot of the season. A few tees and fairways are showing the disease so we will monitor this closely over the next few days and make a decision on how we are going to handle it.

Dollar Spot on the 11th tee

May Recap

We have had some great weather at the beginning of the season. The greens have filled in well and are looking healthy with a good root system heading into the summer. We have had below average rainfall throughout May, therefore we have been regularly watering greens more so than usual. Our tee renovation and nursery construction are complete and with some good weather in June the tees will be playable in early July. Moving forward into June we will be tidying up lots of small jobs and working on providing quality playing surfaces.

#17 Green

Path Work

Part of our capital improvements this year is resurfacing some of our existing cart paths. We have begun preparation on many of the damaged paths and will be paving these areas soon. Our roadway to the maintenance shop that is used to travel from 4 to 5, 10 to 11 and 17 to 18 was the main area that we began with. 

Resurfacing roadway

Root Pruning
Tree roots compete for moisture and nutrients with our playing surfaces. We have recently been around the property root pruning where we believe the trees are adding stress to the playing surfaces. We stay far enough away to not damage the trees but still help out our playing surfaces. We look forward to seeing the results of this later on in the season.

Root Pruning on the back of 13 tee

Greens Nursery

Our new greens nursery has been completed and ready to begin establishment. Seed and cores from the greens have been applied along with some fertilizer. Our goal will be to have it strong and healthy for the winter in preparation for next spring if needed.

New greens nursery

Greens Aeration

The greens on the course where becoming very firm and infiltration rates where decreasing. When this happens our water, fertilizer and chemical applications become less effective and therefore unneeded stress is added to our greens. Our small tine aeration helps vent the build up of unwanted gasses in the soil profile and a heavy topdressing to fill in the holes provides a good place for further gas exchange. Since we have done the aeration the greens have filled in better and are ready for the pressures to come.

Core harvesting after aeration

Heavy Topdressing

Brushing sand into aeration holes

Smoothing out the playing surface

May Accomplishments

• Finished most repairs on greens
• Mowed and rolled on a regular basis
• Prepared for asphalt
• Asphalted roadway
• Nursery constructed
• 2 tees on 4 and a tee on 9 renovated
• Reshaped edge of 3 pond
• Checked sand depths in bunkers
• Topdressed on Tuesdays
• Aerated greens

Tee Renovation

This seasons tee renovations include the Blue/White tee on #4 and the White tee on #9.

We have been using the following criteria during our tee renovations:

• Level the playing surface
• Provide adequate surface drainage on (1% slope from front to back) and around the tee  
• Increase size when needed
• Aim the tee at the landing area
• Resurface with dwarf bluegrass

 Beginning of the grading process

 Newly sodded #9 White with Dwarf Bluegrass

The benefits of Dwarf Bluegrass

• Can be cut at tee height
• Handles winter stress better
• Divot recovery is quicker
• Is not as susceptible to diseases

 Rough grading of surrounds to drain water away from the teeing surface

 Final Preparations

 Newly sodded #4 Blue tee

Newly sodded #4 White tee