Fairway Bermuda grass eradication program

Assistant Mike made our first bermuda grass eradication spray of our fairways on Friday.  As you might remember, we have 4 fairways(4, parts of 7, 8 and all of 13) in our program.  We  have gone from full fairway applications to spot applications to help reduce the negative impacts on the zoysia.  Our sprays are made going into dormancy in the fall and coming out of dormancy in the spring which has the best chance to injure the bermuda.  The more severely it is  injured, the better opportunity for the zoysia to begin to get the upper hand and we rid a majority of the fairways of the bermuda grass.

Last fall, we sprayed an additional acre of spot spraying on all other fairways except #5.  We did not spray every spot of bermuda but enough to use one acre of spray.  This spring, we spot sprayed 2 acres of product on 4, 7, 8, and 13.  We sprayed another 3 acres over the remaining 11 fairways which increases our total acreage sprayed to about 5 acres.  We have 26 total acres of fairway.

Our plan as usual is to make the first application and then make a second application around May 10th.  We will evaluate the effects the first spray made and get a good idea of how much zoysia is actually present in some of the bermuda areas.  As we did last season, we will replace the worst spots of #4,7,8, 13 with zoysia sod from our nursery.  I don't think we have enough spray applications on other fairways that might warrant sod replacement but we will evaluate that situation as we move closer to the end of spring/beginning of summer.  As mentioned in last seasons postings regarding our program, there are some patches of bermuda that are just too large for us to completely kill all at once because of the cost to to replace the sod.  We will attempt to injure some of these areas to allow the zoysia to continue to move into the area.

Our second application will target areas where zoysia could have the opportunity to over take the bermuda grass.  As  we've seen in the last season, the zoysia will turn a little off color for about 10-14 days but will green up.  The bermuda that has only received one treatement, will turn very off color but usually becomes green again around 21 days after application.  For new members, go to the label section of the blog on the right hand column and click on bermuda eradication program and all the postings in the last year or more related to this program will appear.  This will give you additional details on our plans and will show pictures of the past spray programs and their affects on the turf.  Our goal is to get the fairways green again from chemical injury by mid-June and leave them alone until August where we will then begin our late summer/early fall spot applications.

We are also evaluating the use of another product which is much less expensive on our fairway nursery and the right side of #5 fairway.

Assistant Mike spot spraying #4 fairway.