I just wanted to give a quick update on all the happenings on the golf course:
- This past Monday, the greens were aerified. Since the greens tend to get more compacted over the winter (especially with the rainfall we've had), I decided to pull a 1/2" diameter core by almost 4" deep. This is a little bigger than normal and we had to apply extra sand to make sure the holes were filled completely. With the cooler mornings and heavy dew, we are limited by what we can get done on the greens in the mornings. The dew causes the sand to stick to the roller and mower and creates quite a mess. We have been going out, once everything dries, and mowing in the afternoons. While quite sandy now, the greens are still quick and smooth. Keep in mind with sand on the surface, the greens will not break near as much!
- The entire course was fertilized the past Monday as well. If we catch some of the rain expected on Friday, the turf will really respond. This application should carry us through most of July. At that point, I will make another application to carry us through the rest of the growing season.
- The bunker crews are still hard at it. The bunkers on #6 and #17 have been sodded. The bunkers on #16 and #4 have been shaped and approved by the architect. The crew is currently in the process of adding the Portland cement to these three bunkers. The final bunkers on #5, #12 and #13 have been marked. The architect painted out a new fairway bunker on #13, thinking the old one would be removed. After discussions with George, we are keeping the fairway bunker where it is.
- Utilizing the excess sand from the bunkers, we are constructing a new tee box to the right of the path on #17. This will be used for the green and red tee markers. We are also raising the green tee box on #15. The plan is to make subtle improvements to other teeing areas as we continue to progress through the year.
- A new landscape bed was added around the water station by the driving range tee and one of the beds behind #1 and #10 tee was substantially expanded.
- A growth regulator and weed pre-emergent was applied to the fairways on Wednesday. I saw great success last year utilizing the pre-emergent just in the fairways with regards to keeping them relatively free of goose and crab grass. This year, we will be including the perimeter of the fairways as well as the green surrounds. The growth regulator works to slow down the vertical growth of the turf and force a more horizontal growth. It helps to "tighten up" the fairway turf, cuts down on clipping yield and suppresses bermuda grass seed heads (which wreak havoc on allergies this time of year). This is the start of a monthly application we do throughout the growing season.
- I am about 3 weeks in on a weekly application of an organic acid soil amendment to the tee boxes. After using straight well water most of last year, the tees became quite compacted. The high salt index of the well water along with elevated levels of bicarbonates tend to "tie up" the soil particles, creating a compacted environment. The organic acid amendment, with the help of rainfall, helps to decrease the salt index and remove the bicarbonates. The end result are tee boxes which you can finally place a tee in.
Thanks and have a great weekend!
Chuck McCaskill, CGCS
