The golf course maintenance crew has made a quick transition from maintenance mode to summer renovation mode. On Monday April 30th we had our last shotgun start of the season. On Tuesday morning, May 1st , we had already began our first round of many summer projects. While we do mostly the same things each year there is always something a little different about our program. It may be because we have new equipment available to use or it could be an adjustment to our normal practices because of turf conditions at that time. Following is a quick rundown of what we did on the first Tuesday of our renovation season.
This past winter we had a challenge keeping quality turf on several areas around the perimeters of some of the greens. The challenge seems to be water management where the greens mix meets the native soil. These areas dry out faster than the rest of the green so we are adding soil amendments to help hold the water. To do this the green is aerified first. This was a spot aerification and only the problem areas were targeted. Next a treated sand is poured onto the green and then worked into the holes. We will be doing this throughout the summer in an attempt to modify the soil composition in these areas to give them a better chance of holding onto the water.
Green #1 has a slightly different problem. The back of the green stays wet after the rest of the green has dried. To help this situation we use the same procedure but a different material is worked into the holes. This material is a porous ceramic granule with thousands of micro pores. These granular particles will hold the correct ratio of water to air and allow the excess water to drain through the soil. We will treat this area like the areas around the perimeters throughout the summer with the expectation that they will perform better this winter.
The entire driving range, except for the tee, was aerified. The entire course was aerified 3 times last year. During aerification it was observed that we had got a lot of compaction during the 2010 GCIP and the tines were not getting full penetration, even with several hundred pounds of weight on the aerifier. One of the capital equipment purchase this year was a 72" tractor driven aerifier. This is a heavy duty unit designed to be used on fairways. This week the range was aerified with this unit using large diameter tines. We had great results and I am looking forward to using this unit on the rest of the fairways this season.
All tees were verticut in a single direction this week, and we are planning to verticut a second direction next week.
All of the roughs have bee dragged with this spring tine implement. This unit fluffs the turf and pulls up runners while it is dragged across the turf. It is a simple piece of equipment but it is a great grooming tool. The roughs were mowed immediately following dragging.
While we are performing these summer cultural practices we still remain sensitive to the fact that the course is still open for play, and our members and guests like to have good playing conditions. The activities of this past week should have had little negative impact on play. In fact many of our practices provide better playing conditions, although the result is often brown turf as opposed to green. The inconvenience of these activities is temporary, and the work we are doing this summer will condition the turf for great playing conditions next winter.
On a final note, I'm sure everyone has noticed the pond water levels dropping. There are a few things I would like to point out when we are in these conditions. As the water level drops the nutrient concentration increases and the water temperature rises. These are ideal conditions for an algae bloom. Fortunately we have not had any major blooms like we saw last year following the golf course grow in. For the past year the Grounds Committee has included pond water quality as part of its long range strategic plan. I have learned more about managing these storm water run off ponds too and have changed the way I look at them. I have taken a new look at algae. While it is unsightly it is an indication of excessive nutrients in the water and does a good thing by removing nutrients from the water as it grows. When it is sprayed it dies and sinks to the bottom but the nutrients are still in the water. While not very practical and cost effective the best way to treat algae is to remove it, along with the nutrients is has sequestered. I have been working with our aquatic contractor to explore other options besides constantly spraying to kill algae. Pond colorant and beneficial microbes are 2 options. The long range plan also includes installing bottom aeration in all ponds. While there is no silver bullet or easy answers to some of the challenges to managing these shallow ponds we are on the cutting edge looking for solutions.
In the photo above, what looks like algae is actually aquatic plants growing from the bottom that have surfaced because the water level has dropped. While this is unsightly we would not spray them out since they perform an important function of filtering nutrients from the water. When the rains start again the water level will rise and these plants will once again be under water.
Alan Bakos, CGCS
Director of Grounds
