Observations on a Sunday Morning

This morning I took some soil probes of areas on fairways where we are going to have to regrass certain sections. While not the case in every situation, a majority of the areas had something in common. That is a rock very close to the surface. In this picture the red arrow points to a soil core taken from an area that will need to be regrassed where there is only a small amount of soil before reaching rock. The green arrow points to an arrow just a short distance away where the soil profile is 3-4 times as deep and the turf is fine.

Another interesting observation from this morning has been the trees that are already losing their leaves. It would seem to me that the lack of moisture from not having snow cover this past winter and then getting much less then the average amount of rainfall has caused these trees to go dormant much earlier then usual. In speaking with some of our staff who have been here for quite some time they do not recall seeing this amount of leaves so early in the year. It will be interesting to see how this develops going into the Fall.

Weed Control on Tees

This week we spot sprayed a herbicide on the tees for control of crabgrass. Due to the early Spring that we had crabgrass has been a major problem. The bentgrass on the tees is a little bit more sensitive to the herbicide then the grasses we have in our roughs. So as you can tell from this picture there is some yellowing.

The herbicide has done a great job on the crabgrass! The yellowing of the bentgrass is only temporary.

Weekly Schedule for August 6-12, 2012

Weather and unforeseen conditions can/will change the schedule.

Received 0.7 inches of rain Sunday evening. Mostly as a hard downpour which is not all that helpful. But some is better then none! Hoping for cooler temperatures and night time lows in the 60's. Recovery is not noticeable overnight, but occurs gradually.

-Light dusting of greens topdressing on Monday
-Doing some clean-up from Sunday night's storm. Have several large branches down and lots of leaves and small limbs
-Doing a hard rake on the bottoms of bunkers to soften them up a bit

Dog Days of Summer.....

High humidity, temps around 90 degrees and night time temps in the mid 70's make this the dog days of summer. There is little we can do for turf growth at this point in time until we get highs back toward 80 degrees and lows in the 60's. For now a good defense is the best offense and we are doing all we can to survive.

January 1 through August 1 of 2012 was the driest 7 month period of the past 11 years. We are 8.55 inches below normal. The second driest January through August was in 2002 when it was 6.3 inches below normal. While we do need rain, thunderstorms during high humidity and high night time temps cause waterlogged soils that are prone to disease and lack oxygen in the rootzone for turf to survive. So while rain is needed, a little will do at this point, not a lot.

Driving Range Bermudagrass Photos

Took these photos today (Wednesday, August 1st) two weeks after divots were taken from the lower driving range tee. As you can see the two bermudagrasses are almost completely filled in while the bent/rye mix still has a ways to go.



Patriot Bermudagrass

 

Latitude Bermudagrass





Bent/Ryegrass mix

As a reminder, the bermudagrasses do great when the tempeature is hot and is in full sunlight.

Weekly Schedule for July 30-August 5, 2012

Weather and unforeseen conditions can/will change the schedule.

-Spot aerify and topdress stressed areas in fairways #2, #3 and #4. We still have not seen the rebound from the growth regulators as I discussed last week. In preparation we gave the tees and fairways an extra shot of Nitrogen fertilizer today so when the rebound occurs in the next week they will be ready. The growth is not noticed overnight, but we can tell by the amount of clippings we get when the tees and fairways are mowed. There will still be some areas that we will need to aggressively seed and/or sod. By the end of August we will know where those areas are.

-We are doing a lot of post-emergent herbicide applications to weeds in rough. Our pre-emergent was split into two applications. The second application occurred right at the beginning of our 30 plus days without rain in mid-June. The pre-emergent is activated by soil moisture. Although it was watered in via the irrigation system, there is nothing quite like natural rainfall. It's my belief the second application of the pre-emergent is not working as well due to the dry conditions. This has occurred at other courses in the area as well.

Rain.....Now What?

Last night we received 0.8" of rain. It was much needed. We are still much below average but every little bit helps since natural rainfall is the best type of irrigation.

If the weather over the next few months remains near average I'd expect most of the areas in the fairways to recover within 4-6 weeks. Those areas that do not will be seeded and/or sodded.

We have been using plant growth regulators during the heat so the plants will focus their energy to the roots as opposed to new leaf growth. Even though the plants will turn brown during heat stress most are not actually dead, but dormant. The extra energy stored in the roots during this time helps them survive until a break in the weather occurs. The fairways will come out of regulation in the next 1-2 weeks and a surge in leaf growth will occur. This will aid in recovery as well.

Also, please follow our recommended guidelines for driving range use. The red arrow is pointing to what we DO NOT want to occur, which is a large area without turf. The green arrow points to the proper method with is to leave strips between long lines of divots for faster recovery. Thank you for your help with this.