Collar nursery update

Some of you might have noticed last week that we covered our collar nursery with a white semipermeable cover.  I had the staff put the cover on last week because of the cold temperatures that were predicted.  The green had started to germinate but had not begin to fill in so the cover was put in place to artificially increase the temperature of the soil as well as protect the new seedlings from a hard frost which would slow the new growth.  With the warmer weather predicted this week, we have removed the cover to allow the turf to grow, add additional fertilizer and to apply a fungicide to protect it from disease which can occur during a new grow-in of a green.

Collar nursery under collar.

Collar nursery after the cover was removed.

Collar nursery

Last fall, we renovated the nursery area that was not being utilized near the 16th tee/2 fairway area.  The area is going to be a bentgrass nursery which would then be used to replace various collars on our greens that are severely infested with poa annua.  We added sand, tilled/smoothed the surface, applied a soil fumigant to remove all weeds/seeds, and seeded bentgrass into the area.  We had an fair germination of the bentgrass which was then damaged severely by a 3" rain in early October.  We applied a fine particled sand to the mix but the overall existing blend of sand still too coarse for growing a dense stand of bentgrass that will then be removed as sod.  

This morning, we hauled another 10-12 tons of sand to the site and spread it with our bunker rake.  The sand is being tilled/blended, raked smooth with the bunker rake and will be allowed to settle for a few days by rain or irrigation.  It will be seeded, fertilized and covered in the next couple of weeks.  

Assistant Mike tilling the fine particled sand into the existing sand profile.      

Update on Collar Nursery

Well, the cool wet weather of October did not help the seeding of our collar nursery. Rains washing away part of our seed and caused rutting in different areas of the seedbed. We've kept the green covered and have had some additional germination and growth. The nursery is sloped from from right to left as you can see which creates some moisture issues. Wet to the bottom and dry towards the top which has affected the germination of the higher end.
We continue to fertilize and push the growth to this nursery. Normally, we would have rolled and mowed a few times by now but with the slow growth we have experienced, we hope to roll the nursery in the next couple of weeks which will help to press the plants into the surface and will begin to smooth the surface. Some light topdressing will also help in this process as well.

Collar nursery seeding

A few weeks ago, I posted some initial pictures and information regarding the collar nursery we are preparing in the area of the 16th tee and 2 fairway. Well, we finally got the nursery seeded today. A few weeks late but it should sprout in the next couple of weeks and begin to grow.
A few pictures to explain our process. Asst. Mike is spreading some fertilizer and micro nutrient products on the surface. He then mixed some organic fertilizer with our Cato/Crenshaw bentgrass seed and spread it 2 directions onto the surface of the sand. Did you know there are 7,000,000 seeds per pound? We seeded 6#s of seed on this nursery with over 42,000,000 seeds planted. Six pounds of seed would fit in a large coffee can to give you some sense of the size of this very small seed.
Skip then used our bunker rake machine to help press the seed into the surface of the sand.

This process is called dimpling of the sand which you can see below.
Once this process was complete, the area is covered by a turf blanket which allows for light, water and air to penetrate and will help hold in some heat for the seed to germinate. You will notice over the next 4-6 weeks that the blanket could be off during sunny days and will be placed back on at night to help hold soil temperatures up to keep the green growing for a bit longer this season.
Additional information on Cato/Crenshaw bentgrass can be found in the following link.

http://www.pickseed.com/usa/Products/PDF/cc_blend_ts.pdf

Green Collar nursery renovation

Its been a few weeks since I've posted on the blog. Time to get back into the swing of things.

We've been working the past couple of weeks in the area to the front and left of 16 tee and to the left of Hole #2. This is an area that we are going to grow bentgrass for next fall to begin replacement of some of our poa infested collars. It will also serve us during the season in case any collars become damaged and need replacement turf. It will be mowed at our current collar height of .300" once it has matured next season.

A few weeks ago we used roundup and broadleaf weed control products to kill the weeds including bermuda that were growing in the area. We also had to use our sod cutter to remove some of the material that was laying on top and to cut a border around the outside of the area.

The area is about 55 x 100 feet. The lower 1/4 of the area will be placed in fescue because it has a tendency to hold too much moisture. Our total bent nursery area will be about 3500-4000 square feet.

The pictures below show the nursery with water being applied to it. We placed a granular soil fumigant material on the surface to eliminate any additional weed seeds and disease which could be in the soil. We watered this material in and continue to place moisture on top of the sand to keep the material active in the subsurface. In about 10-12 days, we will add some nutrients to the base and will seed it with our Cato/Crenshaw mixture which is currently on our greens.

The picture below is of our collar on the practice green near Dr. Ott's clock. The area between the Sweetgum tree and the planter wall in fron of the pro shop is mostly poa annua. The rest of the collar is in pretty good shape and has a majority of bentgrass in its area. Right now, we are treating our greens with Trimmit(Paclobutrazol) which is a growth regulator that slows the growth of both our bent and poa. An added benefit of applying this material is that it suppresses and reduces the competitiveness of the poa, and in some cases will kill the poa. The fall applications do not usually kill the poa. Its the spring to summer applications that can put some serious harm in the poa so this is a product we have to be very careful in applying.

Ok, the picture below shows a spot of bentgrass that my telephone is in the middle of. The bentgrass has a tendency to be darker in color and lays over. Poa makes for a great putting surface because of the number of plants per square foot and it stays more upright but it has serious disease and heat issues in our part of the country.

The following picture is a collar on the same green that has a majority of bentgrass in it. The phone is sitting in a small population of poa. Our spray program will have the affect of continuing to reduce this poa population plus at the same time increasing the bentgrass population. When we aerify in October, we intend to seed some additional bentgrass into the greens to continue to add to our bentgrass plant bank and add more new plants to the green surface.