Fairway Bermuda Eradication

The spray applied a couple of weeks ago on our fairways has started to show some results.  It has turned the bermuda off color and it is injured.  With frost right around the corner, the injury put on the bermuda as it is going into dormancy should severely stunt it as it tries to come out of dormancy next spring.  It will then be decision time based on how much zoysia is in the area if I spray it right away.  If the area is completely void of zoysia, spraying it again could take out the bermdua completely which would then force us to sod the dead areas which can get expensive.  If the area has zoysia in it, we might hit these spots again which will encourage the zoysia to grow because it has less competition and we continue to injure the bermuda.  One of the techniques we can use is to spray edges of bermuda which will allow the zoysia some advantage and it would be able to grow back into these spots.  Realize that bermuda can out grow zoysia by at least 3 times its growth rate.  Mr. David Stone CGCS from the Honors Course in Tennessee told me one time that you will probably never get rid of the bermuda completely.  Drainage areas/wet areas or areas that are too shaded will not support healthy zoysia.  Bermuda enjoys excess water and can handle shade better than zoysia.

I will also be spraying some areas of the rough with an application of our bermuda suppression material which should hurt it going into winter.  We will probably do a spray in the spring to reduce its growth in early summer which should make your summer golfing next season not quite as difficult if the bermuda is not as aggressive.  

This is the area on top of #10 looking back toward the lakes.    

The area to the right of the brown bermuda extending about 10' or so is part of the fairway and intermediate that is probably 100% bermuda.  I did not want to spray all this area at once because if it all went out, we would have to replace it with zoysia.  My hope is to injure the reddish brown area giving zoysia the chance to fill back into these areas.  We still might have to replace some zoysia but I am trying to keep it to a minimum.

This is the area at the bottom of #13.  You can see the areas effected from the spray.