Fairway Recovery 2014

It's been quite a while since I put anything on the blog.  I have been busy with many different facets of the golf course the last two months.

The last post I had was dedicated to the fairway damage from Winter Kill.  We tried seeding the fairways with Bermuda grass.  That was a big dud.  As soon as we finished seeding it rained for like a week and a half.  All of the low areas that were damaged from holding too much moisture continued to hold too much moisture.  My best guess is that the seed was either covered by debris and couldn't find the light of day, or it simply rotted in place.  After that experiment failed we decided to aerify a couple of the fairways and push the cored to the bad areas and use that vegetation to regrow the areas.  This was a successful method, very labor intensive but successful.  We had our worst fairway on #3 that had no grass on the front half of it, so aerifying was not an option.  We started cutting sod in house from rough areas that were going to be converted to native this fall.  This was even more labor intensive but at the same time productive.  In August we ran out of time and labor for cutting sod in house so we got 6 pallets of Bermuda for the biggest areas on #3 fairway.  Finally today we are laying the last few small spots on #3 to finish it up.  I am glad that the weather has been as cool as it has been this season.  The greens have been easier to maintain in this weather so that we could focus more on the fairways.

I think that one good thing has come from the Winter Kill.  We have seen what Hole #9 looks like when it has no cart traffic.  We actually have rough on the inside of the dog leg.  We have decided to keep the hole cart path only for the long haul to protect the character of the hole.

I know I've said it before and I'll say it again.  I hope never to go this long again without posting on this forum.

Another Aerification Article

Yep, We aerified the greens again.  I was trying to think of a different way to communicate this topic because I'm sure that I've beaten it like a drum in past posts. 
My staff and I have aerified, cleaned off cores, picked up cores, sanded, fertilized twice, brushed, and watered all day long.  This was my 13th time aerifying the greens here at IHGC.  The 27th time for my career.  Over that time period it gets pretty difficult to change your methods.  However, I did change some of the chemical and fertilizer methods that I used to hold true to.  I won't bore you with the details, but the generalities are, something to make the greens more firm and more fertilizers of different varieties. 
Normally on Aerification day we are still plugging away (literally) at the greens until 5:30 or 6:00 PM and wouldn't finish topdressing and dragging until noon on day 2.  But, my staff was clocking out at 4 PM because everything had gone so smoothly.  Still not exactly sure where the reduction in time came from but I like it. 
I will be posting a video of the process on my youtube channel before too long so that you can better see the whole process in action. 
We punched 4.6 million holes in the greens.  That's just shy of 250,000 holes per green on average.

Fall Aerification

Not to sound hokey but "It's that time of year again".  Aerification.  We have completed the aerification of the greens and they have recovered for 2 weeks now and they are looking great.  I went on vacation for one week and they have almost healed completely.  I am terrifically thrilled at their progress this season.  We have had some great weather since poking holes, 80's in the day and 60's at night.  I have created another "flip book video" from my trail camera to observe the process on #4 for the last 2 weeks.  I was hoping to get a better comparison of aerified greens to healed greens, but that didn't translate as well as I had hoped.  most of the physical processes were recorded and are subtitled in the video.  some of the processed were missed such as fertilization and watering.  But, please remember that a lot of hard work goes into this process.
Here's the "Flip Book"

Aerification Video Link on YouTube

I hope that you can see the progress as well as I can.  Again this is still a new process of documenting these types of events, and I learn something new about it every time I try. 

What a difference a year makes

Well, Summer's here again and the temperatures are starting to heat up.  Yesterday was our hottest temp so far this year at 94 degrees.  I know it sounds hot.  Just remember where we were one year ago.  We were just starting the heat wave of 2013, we were getting ready to see temperatures we had never experienced before in this region (19 degrees warmer than yesterday) and we were in the 6th week of a drought.

Last year we were so busy with the drought and the fairways and the tees were in such poor shape that we did not aerify either one of them.  Shortly after the heat wave we got a massive amount of rain for a few days.  the fairways and tees turned out to be great through the end of the season.  Well we have had an ample amount of rainfall this season (no droughts here), and the temperatures have been moderate.  So we have gotten to perform some cultural practices that we couldn't do last year.  We have completed the fairway aerification plan and we are in the process of wrapping up the tee box aerification plan.

Our tee box aerification plan is almost identical to our fairway aerification plan with the exception of the machine that we use to pull plugs and the hole size.

Our tee plan we use 5/8" tines on a 2.5" spacing.  Fortunately, our tees for the most part were constructed with a sand cap.  This means that when we pull the plugs and let them dry for a few minutes, when we hit them with a metal drag mat the sand breaks off of the plant and works back in to the surface.  This leaves only the leftover plant material to deal with.  we simply take a turbine blower and push the leftover vegetation into the roughs.  A little bit of water and were done.  Below is a short video of Spencer running the aerifier on #16 Tees.

Our Fairway plan is slightly different, same process (core, drag, blow).  We use an old fairway aerifier that we pull with a tractor.  the holes are 1" on a 6" spacing.  The soils in our fairways are clay.  so they have to have some moisture in them to be able to break up with a drag mat.  We have to wait until the day after a rain event so that the clay is not rock hard when it comes out of the ground.  After they are out of the ground we drag them and blow off the vegetation.  I kind of like our old fairway aerifier in our heavy clay soils.  the way it works the tine goes in the soil at about a 10 degree angle and it comes out at the reverse 10 degree angle,  so it has to fracture the areas around it due to its movement below the surface.  So the effected area in the soil would be closer to 2.5".

I know that everyone hates the dreaded "A" word.  but it really does make us have a better playing surface in the long run, and who knows, maybe one day we will get to backfill the holes in the fairways with sand.

Spring Aerification

We have just completed one of the toughest jobs of the year, Spring Aerification.  Normally its a job that most people don't see outside of course staff.  I decided to take a few videos to show some of the processes that we use.  This year I decided that we needed to aerify the greens twice.  We didn't really get a true aerification last fall.  Yes, we "poked holes", but we only used 1/4" tines and we did not add any sand as I didn't want to be too abrasive to the greens in their frail state last fall.  This spring we are using 5/8" tines on a 2 " spacing, and we are aerifying them in two directions.  The whole goal in this process is to create Macro pores.  Macro pores are porous spaces in the soil that allow for gas exchange, water movement and root growth.  As the season goes on the macro pores get compacted or occupied by roots or dead roots and they become micro pores.
The first two videos shows how early we get started during this process.  It is not uncommon to start the process at 4:00 AM.  We had to design a light kit for our equipment so that we can start early.

 

The next video is the process of aerifying the green in the daylight.  This video shows the back breaking labor that the staff goes through to remove the debris.

This video shows the process of applying the sand to the surface of the green.  This is a highly specific job.  Too little and the surface will not be smooth.  Too much and the grass may never see the light of day again.  

 

There are a few steps that I did not show Fertilizing, Dragging, Watering and Rolling.  3 of the 4 are really not worth seeing.  Unfortunately I was doing most of the dragging of the sand and it was hard to make a video of myself.

Hopefully this helps explain why we do this process every spring and fall and the hard work that goes into it.  I know that the playing conditions are not great for a couple of weeks after the process.  But just remember that Tom Watson shot his personal best low round on freshly aerified greens.

State of the Union Address

It's been a while since I posted any information on here this year. I apologize for the delay. We have had a really busy year on the golf course, the season is by no means over but it is on the decline. We have had many things going on with the course this season, both good and bad. We also have some changes that are still in progress.

The new bunkers that we built last winter were finally opened this spring. It is so nice to hit out of some actual sand when you get in a bunker. We have had nothing but compliments on them. We are getting ready to start working on some more of the problem bunkers on the course by either removing them or rebuilding them. I hope to redo 3-4 bunkers this winter and remove about 5 more. Hopefully one day we will finally finfsh the bunker project.

Irrigation has been a large headache this season. If you have ever spoken to me concerning our system, I probably said," It's our system and it is what it is". This is not a negative statement, we have a 25+ year old irrigation system, and that's what we have. It is not going to work like a brand new one, but it will get the job done for now. I spent the majority of the first part of the summer chasing heads around the course trying to get them to shut down or come on. I ended up replacing about 22 old sprinkler heads this season with new ones. We still have a few to go (850 heads on the course, replaced about 115 = about 15%).

The ponds on #11 and 12 have been an issue again. The fountains have been turned off. They are too small to operate in water that dirty. I wish they were the answer but they are not. There is a question to ask, why does #12 look so bad and #13 look so good? The answer is pond construction. The ponds are attached and #13 is filled with water from #12. #12 Pond is about 4 feet deep and #13 pond is at least 10 feet deep. In the deeper a pond it is less likely that sunlight will reach the bottom floor of the pond, and create breeding grounds for algae. I do not know if we will be able to fix the problem with #11 and 12 without starting over with new ponds.

We are in the middle of creating new natural areas. We have about 6 acres of new natural areas in the initial growth stage on #'s 8,9,10,11,12,13 and 18. The seedlings are just emerging from the seed, and we are getting ready to fertilize these areas. Most of the areas are irrigated. We are running programs with our irrigation system to make sure that these areas are watered thoroughly and have plenty of moisture for grow in. The bulk of these areas are on #11-13. When these areas have matured this area of the course will not play much differently, but will be more vsually appealing from the tee. Please keep all traffic out of these areas, and play them as ground under repair for the time being untill we establish a hazard ruling on these areas.

We have just finished aerifying the greens for the fall. I am really happy about the sand application that we made. I believe that it was the perfect amount. I played 9 holes the day after we finished, and truthfully thay are not bad to play on. Putts were not jumping around and breaks are minimal. Remember that aerified greens make your short game much better. We are already mowing the greens for the first time since punching them. I think we will get a great heal out of them.

I know this was a lot of information for one post, and there weren't a bunch of happy pictures to look at. I will do my best to get some pictures next time. And I will do my best to get more information back out to you the golfer.

Aerification

Anyone who has played at the course in the last week knows that we have aerified the greens last Monday. They have been healing in great. Unfortunately on the day that we had planned to start the temperatures reached a scorching 96 degrees and caused a slight degree of damage to 4 greens. It is not severe damage, as I look through the damaged canopy area I could see green leaves trying to emerge within 3 days of aerifying.
I am trying some different methods this time, and so far I have been pleased with the results. I have increased the fertilizer levels by 25%. I have changed the type of initial fertilizer that I use also; the jury is still out on that one. I have also decided not to increase the height of cut drastically this year during the grow-in process. I am hoping that a tighter mowing practice through this time will encourage more lateral movement by the plant. I am happy with this process so far.
I know that nobody likes playing on greens that have holes and sand all over them. Keep this in mind, Tom Watson shot his personal best record low round on aerified greens. So, remember to hit it firm and at the back of the cup. We should be healed within the next 2 weeks.
Thanks for bearing with us.

Spring Aerification

Well it's that time of year, time to poke holes in the greens again.

I thought I'd take a minute and explain the process and why we do it. I know everyone hates playing on aerified greens, myself included, so why not give an explanation to why.

There are several reasons why we do this; to increase the oxygen available to the plant, relieve compaction, remove excess thatch in the soil, create a firm playing surface for the upcoming season.

First off, by removing cores of old soil from the greens we remove a percentage of thatch, dead organic material in the soil structure. The dead organic material, plant roots, clog up macro pores in the soil structure no longer allowing them them to hold oxygen. Once these macro pores have the dead material in them they are referred to as micro pores, which will really only hold water and will not allow the soil to become firm. We are replacing the old soil with sand. The sand has no thatch and lots of macro pores. This creates new channels for roots to grow freely down through the soil where they can still receive proper amounts of oxygen. Another benefit to these deep channels of macro pores is increased drainage. These large pores don't really hold water that well, they give surface water a better route to escape to the subsurface drainage.

I hope this gives anyone who's interested a better idea of why we go through this process every six months or so. We are scheduled to start on March 15th weather permitting. hopefully we will be grown in about 3 weeks later with a little help from Mother Nature.

Aerification

We are 15 days out of aerification of the greens, and they are healing well despite back to back frosts last weekend. The greens are still being cut higher than normal. We do this to allow the plant to be a little more tolerant of the stress, and as to not pick up any of the layer of sand that we put down on the surface of the green. We will start dropping the height of cut to the seasonal standard next week as long as the heal in stays on this path.

Here is a picture of the middle of the putting green surface I took this morning to let you know what to expect.

I know that aerifing is a headache that comes at some of the best points of the year in golfing standards. It is something that needs to be done though. Every growing season we accumulate thatch in the soil from decomposing organic material. We have to go in and physically remove a certain amount of this material and replace it with clean sand. If the thatch layer is allowed to continually increase it will result in a poor surface throughout the season.