When It Rains, It Pours

After going on a 24 day drought we have received nearly 4 inches of rain in 4 days! Naturally the change took place during “The Heritage” as it has done in previous years. The maintenance squad is really bummed we weren’t able to put on the type of event we hoped.  We were dialed-in during Thursday’s practice rounds with every playing surface cut perfectly and greens rolling an 11 on the stimp!

The calm before the storm 

We fought through the weather over the weekend and are thankful the tournament was still played all the way out to the end! Congrats to the winners! 

Mowers were replaced by squeegees, bunker rakes, and a pump.

Monday, we vented greens to try and influence gas exchange and dry down, but more storms keep the greens completely saturated with cups full of water. Greens are extremely wet, so we are taking precautions to not sand topdress with heavy equipment or roll greens until we get some dry down.  Thanks for your cooperation and understanding while greens speed is on the slower side. Hoping to dodge a bullet to get fairways mowed on Wednesday. 

Creating airflow with venting and using a powerful blower to try and dry down #15 green.

Maintenance Mayhem

Wow! After a 3 day holiday weekend the club was closed on Tuesday. The golf course maintenance gang went to town with a wide open golf course. Numerous important tasks were completed while taking advantage of no golfers.

The ongoing  task of Bermuda suppression was done around our greens in the zoysia collars.  This is an extremely important task to have ample time for the product to dry on the leaf before having foot traffic walk through it and walk on the green as it would harm our  bentgrass greens. For this reason, this practice is a challenge for us to do during play days so Tuesday was perfect!

Tree work was also on the hit list. We removed a pine tree next to the cart barn that was causing debris issues in the cart barn drain. A dead elm tree at the maintenance facility was removed as well. Last but not least the famous Oak tree on hole number 18 was limbed up significantly and shaped a little bit. 

Bunkers made the cut too! We are experimenting with some rubber based paint to color our black liners white so when exposed they are much easier on the eyes. The bunker behind 6 and a few bunkers at 12 green were done this time. We plan on continuing this process when time allows, but this is another hard task to get done during play days. I have been waiting on transportation of white bunker Sand to maintain proper Sand depths in bunkers. After four weeks we are supposed to receive a load this Friday, so we will be addressing bunkers very soon.

Putting greens were also vented. Once again this process helps exchange gases within the soil and promote root growth at this time before summer sets in. We followed up with a smooth roller and a light top dressing on Wednesday. Our sanding rate was a little heavier than I would’ve liked but greens will be great for the weekend.

Finally, on Tuesday we started sod prep to repair poor areas in fairways. Prep was finished on Wednesday and sod was completed today on Thursday! Please avoid driving through these areas or walking through them. They will be pretty soggy for the next week or so to get the turf rooted in.

Our landscape bed rehab at the bogey hills clock near the practice green is complete! Great work by our horticulturist, Jeny, planting a variety of plants for a new upgraded look!

Jacket Weather

Wow! It has been unseasonably cold, I’m still busting out my carhart coat in the mornings. What this translates to is I keep pushing back the opening of the turf on the range tee. Luckily we have a really nice mat system that you are all enjoying! We will need temperatures steady in the 70s before I feel comfortable opening the tee. This is a good time to remind you all that I am allowing carts to drive in the roughs because the fairways really aren’t growing yet. Here’s a picture of our golf course indicator board. The cart ruling of 90° with no restrictions means you CAN drive in the rough!!!  I actually would prefer to see members driving in the rough as opposed to fairways currently.

We finally are gaining staff members after a shorthanded spring. There is a lot going on on the golf course and I’m really excited about this weeks work already! On Monday we planted almost 20 trees in Strategic locations. The two main areas were next to #2 tee complex and more trees added behind the back left of #8 green.

Monday we also vented greens for the first time this season. This process is a light aerification with a small solid tine. The holes are so small they really don’t disrupt play, but each one of these holes are nearly 4 inches deep into the soil profile which will allow for roots to dive in and grow rapidly. This stimulation of roots will help us later down the road when summer starts stressing out the turf.

Jeny and other staff members have been working really hard at getting our annual flowers in the ground! We also hit the reset button on one of the flowerbeds near #4 Green. We are waiting on a piece of equipment to arrive so we can attack our clock bed near the practice green.

Finally, we are two weeks into our weekly practice of light sand top dressing greens. Top dress Tuesdays is what we call it!! This process helps keep greens firm and rolling true and smooth!

Mercy!

A look around the golf course would make you think it’s been a productive week or two... greens successfully aerated, bunkers getting raked, started mowing roughs, grinding stumps, back filled and sodded, #14 trench sodded, compost spread in landscape beds, etc. But the truth is we or maybe just me is extremely frustrated.

This time of year is crucial for a laundry list of important chemical applications.  Granular crabgrass control treating 80 acres of roughs, chickweed, henbit and clover broadleaf control in roughs, preventative large patch control treating 17 acres of zoysia surfaces, granular fertilizer on greens to help heal from aerification, poa seed head suppression application and spring preventative disease control on greens too!  All of these applications need to get done within a 7-14 day window and all have the same restrictions.  THE WIND!!!! We need wind speeds of no more than 5mph to do granular fertilizer on greens and less than 10mph for all other applications.  It’s been either too wet or too windy for 2 weeks straight.  We have started and stopped applications multiple times this week, trying desperately to sneak in a greens fertilizer in the morning before the wind picks up.  Over a four day period we have completed 12 of our 19 greens.  We hope to finish the last 7 on Monday. 🤦🏻‍♂️

If you have read this far it probably appears this is more of a rant than an exciting blog, and I suppose you are correct. 😂 But geeeez, just another example of how challenging golf course maintenance is being at the MERCY of Mother Nature at all times.  When things get dicey or not executed perfectly I use a term with my crew, “it will buff out”.  Growing up around cars it’s my go to, and I guess I can apply it to this situation.  We will be fine, we will adapt and overcome, it will buff out.  Thanks for all the support, it’s great seeing everyone back out on the golf course!!!

Chopping Arms and Legs

A little late with this entry but last week we did some impressive tree work.  A mini excavator was used to prune the roots behind number 14 green. We dug a trench about 3 foot deep and severed hundreds of cypress tree roots. Every one of these roots had reached out into the green and had been sucking water and nutrients from the green. Some can even recall last fall when we had to cut multiple root knots out of the surface of the green as well. This process of pruning the roots will have to continually get done every couple of years. This area will be getting a little extra zoysia collar width in the near future.

A lot of lower limbs were trimmed off of trees in various areas of the golf course.  We intend on continuing to raise canopies of trees throughout the season. We do have to take a small break while trees are budding and leafing out. During this time it is the worst time to trim trees because they are translocating all their water and energy towards producing leaves and can leave trees Susceptible to pests as it takes longer for their wounds to heal.

Winter Projects/Spring Cleaning

From 0-70 in a flash, temperature that is!  Last week the ground was frozen solid and covered with 6+ inches of snow, this week mild and pretty dry all considered. That’s the MO we know and love, kinda...

We successfully completed the installation of the new practice facility netting.  This will retain mishit golf balls, saving the club resources.

Creek stabilization got a good start, but a few areas were too dangerous to do under snow cover.  This will be continued when the ground is firm.

Moving on to this week, we mowed greens for the first time in months and raked half the bunkers(once they thawed) on Thursday.  The other half will be completed today(Friday).  Hole locations and markers were moved this week too.  

We are also wrapping up our annual warm season turf clean up.  We apply pesticides to eradicate non desirable cool season grasses while also applying pre-emergent herbicide to keep warm season weeds from encroaching during the golf season.  We use blue tracker dye to help with visualizing coverage.

Tree-mendous Challenges

It appears the drought is finally over and we’re getting an early dose of November rain.  We received a total of 1.4 inches last week with more expected early next week. Ironically, we had only received 1.4 inches within the previous 66 days during the drought.

In the past month we have encountered multiple challenges due to trees. The constant leaf litter, sticks and limbs are one topic, but it has actually been the roots wreaking havoc.  Trees are important to the identity of BHCC and they are constant work.  There is a lot of various tree maintenance on tap this winter.

Distinct border line of yellowed turf in the root zone of trees during the drought.  Trees are more efficient at pulling  nutrients and moisture out of the soil than turf.

An irrigation leak caused by tree roots pushing and moving an irrigation pipe.

The best for last...

Cypress tree root knots surfacing in #14 green! They were cut out and turf replaced. We will be root pruning behind this green this winter.

Moving Forward

Hello!  Time to dust of my blogger app!  It’s turned into a really busy year and the past month has been jamming with both golf and maintenance events!

I’m going to start with a really cool video that has been going around about the golf course maintenance crews preparation for this past weeks US Open. This video really demonstrates the same thinking, planning and work we do at BHCC, just on a slightly smaller scale. Take a look! 👀 

Behind The Greens Winged Foot

Now back to Bogey!  We successfully completed the aerification of greens for this fall season! Technically we actually did them twice.(shhhhhh)🤔🤫 

A week ago we pulled a 1/2”core, cleaned the surface, sanded, brushed, blow excess sand, roll, water and everything else under the moon during a couple long days.  This week we snuck in a 1/2” solid deep tine at a 6” depth! The trick is that the solid tine leaves a smaller affected hole in the surface than a 1/2” hollow tine used the week previous.  The result is NO added recovery time!  Tomorrow we are fertilizing greens which will help finish closing in the holes by the end of next week hopefully.  Please note we dislike the aerification process as much as the members dislike the putting surface during the healing time.  I enjoy looking at a perfect and tight putting surface and it kills me to look at bumpy holes but we know this is the necessary process to allow us to provide premium putting greens throughout the golf season! Thanks for your patience and understanding!

Picture after pulling 1/2” core a week ago

Picture after 1/2” solid this week

We have also made a mess out of the roughs while over-seeding a fescue/bluegrass mix.  Most seeding was concentrated around greens and fairway entrances and exits.

Finally, last week we also treated fairways for Bermuda contamination for the last time this year.  With this application and the unseasonably cooler weather, fairways have really yellowed off quick.  Unfortunately that means the change over to carts on paths is looming in the near future.

Caught Up To Speed

A quick update to get everyone up to speed.  We have been busy punching holes in our warm season surfaces.  In the past two weeks we have solid tined all of our collars, pulled a core on selective tee boxes and attempted to pull a core in fairways.  We received a surprise storm the night before the scheduled fairway aerification and decided it was too wet after starting #17 fairway.  We are looking to possibly reschedule fairway aerification for July 27th.  During this span of time we have also vented greens with needle tines and continue to do so on a biweekly basis.

We have also made applications to fairways, collars and tees for Bermuda suppression.  Current bronzing in collars are an indication of hurt Bermuda grass.

Last but not least, damaged areas in fairways and a few small spots in collars were repaired with zoysia sod.  We have a few more small areas left to complete.