Greens Aeration started today

Just a quick note to let you know the greens aeration started today.  All 19 greens had cores pulled and all cores picked up.  Practice green and holes 1-14 holes todressed with sand, sand blown and drug into holes and the greens were rolled.  We still have to clean up around greens from excess plugs and some extra sand needs to be cleaned up.  Holes 15-18 will be be completed by around noon.  Pictures and full description coming in the next day or two.

Rain days, still work to be done

We hate to see rain days in the golf business but from time to time they do occur.  This morning we took the opportunity to transition the shop facility from winter to a more active spring facility.  As you might remember from previous posts regarding the wood burning furnace, we had a piece of 6 mil poly stretched across the maintenance facility to reduce by about 1/2 the area that we needed to heat.  Jason suggested we roll the poly up in place and tie it to the rafters.  Good idea and saved us some time in stringing it back up again next winter.  8 tons of clay for the tennis courts have been stored in the facility to insure that they stay dry until we lay the material in early May.  It had to be moved out of the center of the building and placed against the wall.  A little cleaning and moving some equipment around got us to our major task of the day. 

Planting all of those baby plants that arrived yesterday.  The guys went through about 3400 plants today which saved me a great deal of time.

Russ watering the plants after they are potted and placed on the utility vehicle and place in the greenhouse.  Jason, Skip, Mike and Tom planting in the background.

A view from the other side.  Asst. Mike is using a small punch to poke the plugs out of their seeding tray so Tom can plant them in their growing 6 pack tray.  Some of the plugs are the size of a thimble.  Asst. Skip and Jason working on the other side and Russ watering in the background.  The guys commented at the end of the day that they look forward to going back outside on Friday. 

About 4000 plants in the greenhouse with about another 1000 to be planted on Friday.

4000 babies arrived from Michigan

I guess I'm like an expectant father waiting for the birth of his child.  Well, 3 boxes of our baby plants arrived today, 4006 babies to be exact with the remaing 1200 set to arrive in the next couple of days.  I took a picture of the group sitting patiently on a standard 8 foot table in our break room.  The most time consuming part of the greenhouse process is getting the baby plants in containers and put safely away in the greenhouse.

6-8 weeks of going through adolescents where it is our job to provide the right amount of water, sunlight, warmth, and pruning where they will continue to grow into young adults.  Hopefully, they will not be temperamental and will follow the guidance that we provide for them.  They will then be sold to our members for their gardens and or will be planted in our ornamental beds in May where they will hopefully mature to the beauty that I had first imagined back in December/January.      

Begonias, Impatiens, Petunias, Vinca, Marigolds, Salvia, Zinnia, Celosia, Melapodium, and ornamental pepper oh my.

Tree management program/covering ground stumps

We started filling the ground stump areas with top soil today.  We will allow the material to settle some over the next week or two.  We will then smooth the area again with a finishing layer of soil and will cover with sod. 

Loader filling up the cart with soil.

Backing up to the hole and dumping the load into the hole.

The hole topped off and soil stepped in lightly.

Updated feature of blog

I am using a feature from Blogger that allows me to place a word or phrase in a sentence that is automatically linked to additional information on the web.  The linkable word will provide assistance in defining a term we  use on the golf course or explain a process/product in greater detail.  A linkable phrase or word will have a font color of orange fyi or maybe burnt orange for my friends from Texas.  

Discolored turf next to some greens

Those of you that have been out to play the course in the last 7-10 days have probably noticed the off color look of our greens.  I have explained our regulator program in a previous post and how we are trying to encourage our bentgrass and discourage the growth of the poa annua.  As I was checking some greens the other day, I noticed a distinct line between the surround area that received some of the same spray treatment as the greens and the area outside the treatment area.  I took a picture to illustrate how the spray affects the turf both inside and outside the spray zone.       

One of the benefits of having cool season turfgrass around our greens is the ability to spray products which are antagonistic to the poa annua and can injure or kill it.  With millions/billions of seeds being produced on our property, poa is always trying to invade into an area where it does not currently exist, namely the newly sodded fescue areas.  As we spray our greens which are mostly round in shape, we cannot shut off our 3 spray booms exactly as we cross the line between the green and surround.  The spray coming out onto the surrounds provides not only added benefits in reducing poa but also can protect the turf from disease and other pests.  The surround areas do receive control products for disease and insects during the season but not as frequently as the greens because the turf is at least 20 times longer which makes for a healthier, less stressed plant.  We sprayed a fertilizer/micronutrient package to the greens today which should have a positive effect on the color of our greens in the next few days. 

In the picture below, my camera case in on the spray line between the two distinct areas next to the green.  To the left of the case is the area that is coming out of winter naturally and did not receive any spray treatment.  To the right of the case and adjacent to the green is the area that received treatment and shows some discoloration.     

 Left side of 12 green/surround looking from front to back.

Aerifying new sod

We pulled out the walking aerifier yesterday to punch some holes in the new sod that was placed around a number of greens last fall.  We also are punching some of the existing cool season turfgrass areas near the greens and the cool season tees.

Aeration provides some of the following benefits to our turf:

• Reduces compaction of the soil.
• Allows oxygen to penetrate into the root zone.
• Surface water can infiltrate into the ground at a quicker rate which reduces runoff and improves playability of a given turf area.
• Improves root growth.
• Provides small resorvoirs for water to lay in and which is then absorbed by the soil and taken up into the root system.
• Reduces thatch and improves soil microbial population.

Russ along #12 green.

Russ coming back up the hill on #12.