That Smell???

That smell you may encounter today is the result of an application of DPW or dried poultry waste to our Tees and Approaches.  Even though the product we use from Earthworks contains some other choice ingredients including Ammonium Sulfate, a product we employ quite often and Methylene Urea, which is an uncoated version of slow release fertilizer, we still prefer to call it DPW.  Over the last few years we have made the move towards organic products.  As we attempt to strengthen our microbial populations with compost/compost tea applications, we are applying products that compliment and create synergies amongst our fertility programs. 

Ammonium Sulfate provides a quick shot of Nitrogen, while the Urea and DPW work more slowly.  This is a product we use very often, it's cheap, available in liquid or granular and oh did I mention it's cheap?? 

Without getting too technical (or over my skis);    DPW provides carbon rich organic matter to soil microbes which in turn release nutrients available to the grass plant.  So in reality it's feeding the soil moreso than feeding the plant directly, which is environmentally responsible and far more sustainable than merely applying a completely synthetic product.  

Methylene Urea is a different sort of animal involving a reaction between urea and formaldahyde, but also requires the "assistance" of soil microbes.  The reaction creates a polymer chain molecule, the length of which dictates how long its release will last.  It must be dissolved first, broken down by microbes or hydrolysis (secondary means), and finally depending on the length, mineralization takes place and the nutrients become available to the plant.  Whew!

With an analysis of 10-2-5, we put down about 5lbs of DPW per 1000 sq ft this morning so the smell while a little strong, should go away over the next few days.  Any questions about DPW, please contact your local chicken farm...  

    

Repairing Divots

Just a reminder to all of our guests, we ask that all divots be replaced with the original turf whenever possible.  In the event that the divot isn't fixable, only then should sand and seed mixture be used to fill the divot completely.  Here is a short video from the USGA on replacing divots:

As always, thank you for your cooperation with this matter.  We spend many man-hours every week filling divots that had a player taken a few seconds to pick and replace their divot, would be all but healed by the time we fill them with sand.  Our entire cart fleet is equipped with two jars of divot mix on each cart, if for some reason you find your jars empty, please ask a member of the golf staff and they will quickly fill them up for you.  Thanks again.   

US Open week

I can't believe it, but it's already Open week!  Major weeks always provide some added inspiration for our efforts.  While we do love to watch high level professional golf, we are equally thrilled to observe the immaculate condition host facilities are in for these events.  Greens rolling 14' or faster, 4"-6" tall rough, narrowed fairways, shaved down green surrounds, whew!  Golf can't get much more difficult than the US Open, save maybe a dry, windy day at The Open Championship in Great Britain.  While watching these events in admiration of the conditioning and attention to every possible detail is fun, it can also lead to expectations beyond the scope of most public golf courses resources.       

The amount of preparation and the enormous staff required to provide that level of conditioning would shock most golfers.  This year Congressional is hosting the Open and with a long history of major championships, they will no doubt have the course playing as difficult as any course has in past years.  They also will have the help of some 120 volunteers in addition to their own staff to prepare the course every morning and evening for play.  Needless to say, we strive for excellent conditions on a daily basis, but setting up a course like this is best left for special events like the US Open.  For more detailed information about the US Open this year check out http://www.usopen.com/en_US/index.html#!/course.

H2O

It is that time of year again when many of us spend our days behind a hose, watering "hot spots" throughout the course.  Instead of blindly overwatering to prevent isolated dry spots, we supplement our nighttime irrigation with handwatering.  It saves an enormous amount of water over a season and ensures that playing conditions are anything but soggy.   

This winter we purchased a hose reel from one of our vendors and with some input from a few of us, Jim modified an old greens mower trailer so we can tow the reel around with any of our carts.  He mounted a roof to shield 150' of 1" hose from the sun.  The electric motor that rewinds the hose is actually powered by the sun via a solar panel mounted on the roof.  All together it's a pretty sweet little rig, thanks once again to Jim for his ingenuity and quality craftsmanship.  

  

 

Though it's labor intensive, handwatering offers the best opportunity to put water exactly where we want it.  As we are constantly adjusting our system and improving our uniformity, there are still many areas where coverage is still lacking.

In a given round of golf, you may encounter a few staff members out with the reel trailer or with hoses watering hot spots throughout the course. As always they will move out of your way as best they can, please just make sure that they see you before proceeding. Golf ball technology is ever improving, but they still REALLY hurt when they hit you...

Nursery

We maintain a "nursery" of turf adjacent to #17 fairway that we use for plugging or sodding areas that are damaged throughout the course.  It was constructed in 1994 and seeded with Dominant Blend bentgrasses, built on 6" of sand.  It was not constructed with any drain tile or gravel, but has performed just as well as the rest of our greens. 

We have about 7200 sq ft of 1/8" turf that is maintained exactly the same as our other 20 greens, mowed, sprayed, rolled, aerated, etc.  Just as our greens have "manifested" into a poa/bentgrass mixture, so has our nursery green.  We have also experimented with small plots of new varieties, successfully identifying a variety that we have used for inter seeding our other greens for the last 3 or 4 years.

In the next couple weeks, we will be adding onto the west end of our nursery, expanding the 1/4" approach area to provide sod for some tees that we will be adding in the next year or so.  We should gain about 2000 sq ft.  Most superintendents will agree that sod grown on-site will perform far better than sod brought in from a sod farm.  Not that their sod isn't good, but sod cut from different soil, even if only slightly different, has a steeper curve in establishment. 

Our nursery is bordered on the south by white OB stakes, designating it out-of-bounds.  So if your ball happens to land on our nursery, please repair any ball marks, remove the ball and play your ball as the USGA rules dictate.  Look for more posts on the nursery to come and thanks so much for your cooperation.

THE Vibratory Plow

Today we "plowed" through some small irrigation improvements that we have been dreaming of for some time. There were a few spots around the course where we were lacking station wires for additional sprinklers, so we decided to rip in the wires with a small pipe puller.  This particular machine is capable of 12" depth max, which isn't suitable for most irrigation projects we do here, but for ripping in wires in out of play areas it works just fine.  While we had the machine, we ripped in a bunch of poly lines for future additions.  The pipe can function as a sleeve for wires or can be saddled with small sprinklers operated by an electric valve.  Overall it went pretty well and we pulled about 1300 ft of poly today. 

This little guy maneuvers quite well in tight areas and certainly eliminates a lot of the aches and pains of open trenching.  It is however limited by rock and tree roots, which have to be chopped out and removed in order to continue.

       

The majority of our irrigation system is made up of PVC pipe 2" and larger, but small areas where large sprinklers aren't an option,  poly pipe offers and easy and economical solution.  We will complete each of these projects as time and budget allow, but in the meantime the pipe will remain buried and the small slit left behind should heal with a little sand and seed and more wheel packing.  We will talk more about some of our improvements later this summer after some of they have been completed.