Holes and Sand

We wrapped up another spring aeration of the greens today with absolutely perfect weather to help keep the process moving along smoothly.  I realize that millions of holes and thousands of pounds of sand on the greens is less than ideal for the golfers, but it is hard to deny the many important benefits of aeration.

There are really three reasons that aeration is so beneficial, especially on such highly maintained surfaces as a putting green.  Most importantly, aeration opens up the turf surface and allows the proper balance of water, nutrients, and oxygen to reach the roots.  Secondly, turfgrass roots love growing deep and fast into the loose channels of sand that we provide from aeration.  This root development will help to sustain the plants during the hot and stressful summer months.  Lastly, the aeration holes and fresh sand help to dilute the surface organic matter (thatch) that would otherwise leave the greens soft and puffy if left to accumulate unchecked.

Like all things that age, a putting green also requires some serious upkeep and maintenance.  No different than an aging car that went to the mechanic to get fluids flushed, belts changed, bearings replaced, etc.  You could drive that car potentially for awhile longer without doing those things, but the risk of having a serious breakdown becomes much greater.  The same goes for our turf.  Without routine aeration, the potential for a hot and humid summer would leave our greens prone to a major breakdown.

Punching holes with our new aerator we purchased last fall

After the sand has been applied, and the holes punched, then the
sand is drug in with a broom and the surface blown off.

We utilized a new tine configuration this spring as well that should help in a few areas.  The tines we used were smaller than usual, but on a much tighter spacing.  Overall we affected about 10% of the total surface area, which is about the same as when we use the larger size tines.  However, since these tines are much smaller, the tops of the holes will grow over significantly quicker.  Combined with daily rolling for the next few days, and the holes should be almost completely gone within a week.

Pond Leak....Again

It appears that my post back in the end of April about the pond overflow being fixed was a bit premature.  Something changed underground very abruptly last week when the remaining frost finally came out, and the hole in the bottom of the pond where the old overflow pipe was buried opened back up.

Last fall when we dug out the old riser on the pipe, the stub of the 15" steel culvert was dug back into the pond back, smashed, folded back over its self, and buried under 5,000 lbs of concrete and about 2' of silt.  Water however has an amazing way of sneaking through even the smallest of crevasses, and apparently managed to find a path under the concrete slab, and began to quickly erode a channel under it and find its way into the pipe.

The leak became so bad late last week that it was obvious we had no choice but to fix it.  The leak almost completely emptied the pond (about 1.5 million gallons) in only 3 days.  After the pond was empty, we rented an excavator this week, reburied the concrete block in silt, and then dug about an 8' deep hole in the cartpath on hole 8 to remove a section of the pipe and thoroughly fill and pack the void with clay.

Pond leakage at the end of April (just a trickle)

Pond leakage 2 weeks later

Digging the old pipe out in the middle of the cartpath on hole 8

We struggle enough to keep our irrigation pond full of water throughout the summer, allowing this leak to continue throughout the season would have made that an almost impossible task.  While the current fix should prevent any further leakage this summer, the real solution will be to go back in late this fall after the course is closed and dig out the entire 50' section of pipe and refill the entire void with clay.

Tee Box Update

Despite what has been an absolutely horrible spring thus far, we have been able to get all of the bentgrass seed on our new tees to germinate underneath the covers.  Plant seeds require two main factors to germinate:  moisture and heat.  We certainly have had plenty of moisture in the last few weeks, but the heat component has been almost nonexistent.  Fortunately, the covers provide a minor greenhouse effect, trapping in heat from the sun and warming the soil underneath much quicker.  Under ideal circumstances, bentgrass seed should germinate in 5-7 days.  We didn't get much to pop out of the ground this spring until day 15 after seeding.

Under the cover on hole 1 tee

Some sunshine and warm temperatures would do us a world of good right now.  It looks like we are in for hopefully our last few frosts of the season in the next few nights, but then the forecast is looking pretty good.  Now that all of the seeds have effectively germinated and the is weather looking to warm up, the need to trap in extra moisture and heat is no longer necessary, so the covers will be coming off soon.

I am tentatively hoping that by the end of next week we can start cutting sod off of our nursery in order to sod hitting pads in the middle of the new tees so they can be open for play soon.

Another Typical Spring

Of all the four seasons, Spring is always the most frustrating for us in the golf world.  All we really want are some warm sunny days to dry the course out, get some grass growing, and get everyone out enjoying the golf course.  As usual, Spring likes to give us a few teaser days of how nice it could be, but goes right back into being an extension of winter.

While we are still ahead of where we were last year at this time, the excessive rainfall the last week has been a struggle.  We have been able to get most of the seeding work done around the course, so hopefully by the time the warm weather comes our seed will be nice and moist and ready to pop!

All of the new tees have been seeded and covered, and are ready to
start growing as soon as the sun decides to come back.

The middle of 14 fairway where we installed new pipes between the two
ponds last fall has also been regraded and seeded.  Considering how high
traffic this area is, we may end up sodding some of it as soon as it dries up.

Thanks to all the work on the irrigation pond last fall, we have more water than ever stored in our reservoir now.  More importantly, the leaking overflow that was causing us to lose 60,000 gallons a day out of the pond last summer has been fixed (mostly).  It is amazing how water can find its way around a 5000 lb concrete slab, but the old overflow pipe is just barely leaking a trickle now, maybe only 2000 gallons a day.  I cannot state enough how difficult it has been for us to keep that pond full during the summer months, having this project completed will save us a countless amount of wasted time and money fixing and running pumps.

Pond leakage last summer

Pond leakage this spring (hard to see, but just a trickle.)

Another project we completed last fall that is paying huge dividends was our drainage work.  With the 1.5" of soaking rain we had yesterday, one of our worst puddle areas on the course was water free without having to run a pump or squeegee.  This area is directly in front of the left greenside bunker on 6 where last fall we put drainage in that bunker, created a catch basin in the rough, and then trenched a pipe across the fairway to the wooden drainage sump in the right rough.  This area has historically been a massive pond that has required hours of pumping and squeegeeing after a large rain.  Not anymore.

Not a man hour spent or pump run, and hardly a drop of standing water.
We need more drainage!

Unfortunately, it looks like all the rain is going to send the river back over flood stage.  At this point, the prediction is for 32' by this weekend.  Cole Creek was running more water today that I have ever seen it move in the 4 years I have been here.  The flooding shouldn't really cause any problems other than closing the bridge on 17 for a few days.  Hopefully the soil and water temperatures are still cold enough that no turf in 9, 15, or 18 rough will be lost.

Cole Creek was running so hard today there were actually small rapids in it.

Hopefully May will bring us the sunshine and warm temperatures we are all hoping for to finally get this golf season going!

We've had one nice morning for golf so far this season, hopefully more
are on the near horizon.

Its Always Something...

We managed to make it into spring without any major snow mold problems, desiccation, ice damage, or major flooding concerns.  However, a "perfect" spring would be too much to ask for.

We seem to have been struck with a major vole problem over the winter.  Voles are small creatures resembling field mice that live in burrows underground, but during the winter have to come out and feed.  While our deep snowpack was great for turf health, it provided a great deal of insulation as well as protection from predators for the voles to be able to come out and feed.  And of course, what better to feed on that healthy turf on a golf course....

Vole damage on the collar around 8 green

They absolutely destroyed the back of 13 tee

We have usually had very small amounts of vole damage in previous years, but it has usually been confined to the rough.  This year for some reason they decided to venture into the shorter cut turf, doing quite a bit of damage to some tees, collars, and fairways.

Usually with a little bit of topdressing and some extra fertilization these damage areas will go away fairly quickly.

Getting Close To Opening

With temperatures well into the 50s and 60s the last few days, it finally feels like spring has arrived.  The course is getting close to being completely melted off, although there are still a few large remaining drifts on some north facing green banks, and along the west side of the course where the wind blows all the snow in from the field (12 tee still has about 2 feet of snow on it.)

Still some good piles of snow on the upper holes, and lots of water to go away also....

Regardless, everything is looking on track on this point to be a solid start to the year.  The coulee in the course is running hard, and the Red is coming up quick, but at this point the initial forecast is for a crest of about 35' by the end of this coming weekend.  A flood level of 35' barely gets onto the edges of 17 and 9 fairway, but it shouldn't be a problem at all as fast as its supposed to go down.  What we don't need are any large rainstorms in the next 10 days.

View of Cole Creek from the 1/10 bridge.

As of this afternoon, the Red is still pretty iced up, but it should break
free and start moving here in the next few days.

Most importantly, after a fairly thorough examination of the turf on the course today, my suspicions were confirmed:  everything looks pretty good.  There are going to be some isolated areas in the collars on the back of a few greens that might be a little slow to recover.  These are areas that despite our best effort to snowfence, the strong winds over the winter stripped most of the snow off and the turf was left exposed to -33 degree temperatures.  However, these areas will be very small, the rest of the greens, tees, collars, and fairways all look to have missed any major damage.

I am keeping my fingers crossed that we are primed to have a GREAT opening of the golf course this spring.  If the forecast stays dry and the temperatures at least close to normal, then we might be on track to open by the weekend of April 19th, hopefully the range can be open at some point next week as long as the river stays off the lower part of it.  Todd and I will be sure to keep you all up to date as next week arrives.

Fairways look almost perfect, just a few very minor areas of snow mold.

This is an extreme close up view of a collar.  The Poa all looks quite dead
initially, but as you can tell there is plenty of life showing up in there.

Spring Update

After another month of below average temperatures in March (the 5th straight month going back to last November) it looks like spring is finally going to arrive starting next week.  I'm sure all of you are just as excited to get back out on the course as I am!

With that, it is time that we start evaluating the health of the turf as it comes out of winter.  We went out the last few days to remove all the extra snow on the greens with our tractor to see how they were looking.  While it looks like mother nature would have done this work for us within another week or so, a prolonged melt/freeze process this late into spring opens up the opportunity for plants that may have broken dormancy early to take up extra water and literally burst from the inside (referred to as crown hydration).  Removing the excess snow and water before the big melt arrives should limit the possibility of that occurring.

I have said this throughout the winter, but it would appear that we should have very limited turf death on the golf course this spring.  We were blessed with a thick layer of insulating snow back in the end of November, and managed to make it through the entire winter without a melt cycle or rain event that would have formed any ice.

That being said, we are still going to endure a winter of about 130 days of snowcover with temperatures that dropped as low as -33, so it is still unlikely that we will come out completely unscathed.  However, I am optimistic that whatever damage we do see will be fairly limited.  I guess we will find out here in another few weeks!

Our blizzard on Monday wasn't exactly helpful, but it was a beautiful
morning the next day after almost a foot of new snow.

There definitely wasn't as much snow to remove as last year,
but it was still a solid 3 day process.

3 green in particular was deep, and really difficult to clear.

16 green all cleared off and looking mostly good

Collars are of course our major concern, as they tend to contain the
most Poa Annua and are always in rough shape.  From the ones I
have seen so far, I think they are mostly alive....mostly.