Fall Aeration

Yes, that's right, AERATION.  As August draws to a close, we begin to make preparations for our annual fall aeration of our low cut playing areas.  This year we will be deep-tining and core aerating our greens beginning Monday the 19th of September.  In addition we will do our best to complete core aeration of our tees and fairways by Wednesday the 21st. 

The course will be closed until noon on Wednesday and any remaining fairways and tees will be completed shortly thereafter.  This will likely leave approach aeration to be completed while the course is open.  Though this isn't optimal, it is nearly impossible for us to complete everything in such a short time span. 

The aeration process typically goes pretty quickly, as long as we avoid costly equipment problems.  It is normally the topdressing that follows aeration cleanup that takes the most time.  Transporting our topdresser to and from our shop proves to be very time consuming.  We always do our best to make aeration as painless as possible for our guests and members, but some disruption is likely.  Please remain patient and in a couple of weeks, aeration will be only a distant memory.  Thank you for your cooperation.

Where does the time go

In the last couple of weeks, our seasonal staff has dwindled down to only three, two of which are part time.  Unfortunately all of the maintenance tasks completed rather efficiently in the busy summer months are very difficult to complete with a fraction of the staff we enjoy in the peak months.  This means everyone is doing two or three or four things at once, specializing in everything all at once!  It is this time of year that we welcome some cooler weather and dream of frost to slow growth down to a crawl.  We will attend to all of the detail work, it just takes longer and there is an opportunity cost for everything we tackle.  Everyday we will continue to strive for the best playing conditions in the area.  Thank you for your continued patronage.
   

You have to be kidding me!

Early this morning we discovered that an unwanted visitor decided to leave their mark by spinning donuts right in the middle of the putting green. 

The resulting damage could have been a lot worse and luckily it wasn't a large truck or SUV.  Most of the tire tracks rolled out pretty well, but in isolated areas the tires left a 2" deep rut and peeled up some tufts of bentgrass.  Obviously we weren't very pleased with their decision, but we really didn't have time to be upset as our first tee time was in less than an hour (6am). 

We promptly rolled with the tire marks to help smooth some of the lumps created and topdressed/ broomed/ drug the areas by hand and rolled again to work some of the sand into the depressions.  Once we reached a satisfactory smoothness, we ran a mower over to pick up any excess sand left behind. 

The result is undoubtedly an eyesore that will hopefully heal soon with some more rolling and topdressing. 

If anyone witnesses this taking place at Legacy Ridge or any other course, please notify local PD immediately so they can handle the situation.  This type of activity shows a complete lack of respect for private property is no different than vandalising or robbing another place of business.  When you consider that the USGA estimates cost of a new green between $4 and $7 per square foot, if our putting green were damaged beyond repair we could be talking in excess of $50,000 to replace it.  It would require severe damage to necessitate that, but had this occurred immediately after the 4.5" of rain we had weeks ago, that could have been a reality.  Too scary to think about.  Please respect our golf course as we maintain it for you our guests and neighbors. 

High Qualtiy H2O, well sorta...

Picture at 5am didn't come out very good...

Over the last three years we have taken samples of water both before and after it has been applied to our greens.  We installed what we call our sampling pits on four greens #6, 8, 10 and 16.  These greens were selected primarily because they have one drainage outfall, or one pipe where all the water exits.  It is important to that other drain lines tie in below the point in which we sample, so the results aren't skewed by bunker drainage or trunk lines carrying runoff. 

We installed what is basically a 10" drain basin that extends 2-4' down to the trunk drain line carrying water away from the green.  There is enough room to reach down with a plastic bottle and draw out water running through the basin.  We drilled holes in the bottom of the basin and bedded it with gravel to prevent water from stagnating in the bottom between irrigation cycles.     

We have the ability to test for a variety of things, our primary focus to this point has been on monitoring sodium content of the water, and therefore the sodium content of our soil.  Soil salinity is measured as the salt concentration of the soil solution in terms of g/l or electric conductivity (EC) in dS/m.  Our reclaimed water was quite high in sodium when the system first began operating, but has since dropped down to more manageable levels.  The key in that sentence is manageable, it must be managed regularly with deep flushing, calcium and magnesium applications, and most of all aeration.  Extreme sodium buildup can lead to a variety of soil and turf problems, in short it prevents water and nutrients from "attaching" to soil colloids, thus creating less than optimal growing conditions.

We measure the EC of the water we irrigate with, we then soak greens with up to 2" of water, the next morning we measure the EC of the water exiting the green, which tells us how much sodium we flushed.  This helps in determining how heavy we need to water and when we need to apply gypsum to aide in the "flushing" mentioned above.  We typically water greens only as needed which normally equates to 6-10 days depending on weather.  Many courses employ a similar means of monitoring their sodium levels, so this isn't anything new, just another way to better manage our facility.       

Summer turf diseases

If you been out to Legacy Ridge or many of the other courses in the area the last few weeks, you have likely noticed some disturbing symptoms of the irradic weather we have experienced lately.  While I can't speak for other courses, what you are likely seeing are a variety of turf diseases due to our higher than normal humidity, torrential rain, and heat.  Though they don't affect the overall playability of the course currently, they are definitely a big eyesore and theses areas will have to be repaired when disease pressure decreases.

We have suffered from a laundry list of turf diseases generally uncommon in this climate, Pythium Blight, Fusarium, and Brown Patch.  We made a curative application of fungicide to the harder hit areas of the course this week and should see improvement in the coming days.  Throughout the midwest and even back east, theses diseases are a constant threat and many courses employ preventative fungicide applications to prevent or limit the damage incurred.  In their climates it really isn't a question of whether, but when they will have to deal with theses problems.  While I was perusing the couple of the blogs we follow, I came upon a post by Mike Edgerton at Meadowbrook CC in Northville, Michigan.  He covered some of the diseases we have been hit with and if you are interested in a little more explanation of them click here. 

Employee BBQ

Today we are setting up for our annual employee BBQ.  We like to treat the crew to at least one day where we all punch out a little early and enjoy a cookout and social time here at the shop. 

The guys and gals from the Heritage GC take turns hosting and will be over as well this year for a little different fare than in years past.  Typically we cook burgers, dogs and brauts but this year we divided up cooking responsibilities and are serving some actual BBQ! 

Pulled pork, Pork Back ribs, and Brisket are on the menu today and it will be a welcome change from the usual.  A few of us here enjoy tinkering with smokers at home and volunteered our services (however valuable that may be) in preparing the food this year. 

It may seem like a small thing, but it really seems to lift spirits this time of year and hopefully shows our appreciation of the work our seasonal staff do each season.

Interseeding

This morning we verticut greens again in conjunction with a sand topdressing, only this time with a bit of a twist.  With conditions definitely favoring bentgrass at the moment, we took the opportunity to interseed T1 bentgrass while our Poa Annua is stressing a little more from the heat.  After Poa has gone to seed in late spring, it weakens and can quickly lose ground to the deeper-rooted bentgrass when maintained properly. 

We applied seed with drop spreaders before the topdressing went down at a rate of about 1/2#/1000 sq ft.  T1 is a variety we have had success interseeding with and on our nursery green.  It establishes pretty quickly and is a beautiful shade of green when compared to the Dominant Blend bentgrasses we began with 18 years ago.  It is aggressive laterally and has proven to fight off Poa Annua under our maintenance regimen on our Nursery Green.

Following the seed , we applied 24 tons of 80/20 USGA sand/peat mixture with our topdresser, drug it in with our cocoa mat and said a little prayer for seed germination.  The peat isn't normally incorporated in our topdresssing sand, but should hold a little more moisture than straight sand to help the seed stay moist longer.  We will give the seed a light watering each morning to help along germination.  There should be another slight increase in speed following our verticut, and with speeds already at 11' today, it is recommended to keep the ball below the hole whenever possible.

         

Finally feels like July

With all of the rain we received the previous week, the course is plenty green with the exception of some areas that held water in puddles through the daily rain events last week.  Most of these areas are now an unsightly shade of orange and will have to be addressed in the next few days. 

While the grass plant needs water to survive, too much of a good thing can be deadly, especially when heavy rain is followed by high temperatures.  Perfect conditions for Pythium and Melting Out, turf diseases that are fairly unusual in our semi-arid climate, but active under conditions we have experienced the last week and a half.  Humidity levels have dropped back down to more normal levels, so the threat of these diseases has slowed at the moment.  Hopefully it will remain that way.   

We will start with our remedies by aerating these areas with 1/4" solid-tines to open the soil up and allow oxygen into the profile.  "Venting" is a popular practice in wetter regions of the country where moisture is never lacking and temperatures reach the 100's.  Many courses employ this method on a biweekly basis to minimize summer decline on greens, tees, and fairways.  Hopefully it will prove successful in bringing back some of our water logged low areas on the course.  If need be we will reseed these areas and try to get them back in shape quickly.  Your patience is appreciated.   

    

So much rain in so little time

In the past week, we have received more rain than we typically average in an entire summer.  A little over 3" of rain has fallen, much of which came in a matter of minutes.  Obviously our soil can accept a small amount of this rain in such a short time, so the remaining water ends up puddling and running down the drain.  The storm on Friday afternoon produced very strong winds that spread branches all over the course and even down some very large branches and trees.  The weather station showed 1" falling in less than an hour "more like 10 minutes" and another .5" falling a couple hours later in less than an hour. 

All of this, the day before our City Championship.  The course sustained a great deal of damage to bunkers, with most of the sand washing down to the bottom of the traps.  Dave and the guys did the best they could to clean up debris and cutting up fallen branches when they wanted to be trimming the place out and focusing on fine details for the tournament.  We will continue to clean up the mess as we prepare to host two qualifiers for the Colorado Open on Thursday and Monday the 18th.  Sorry there aren't more pictures, most of the damage was too painful to post. 

 



Details

In less than a week, we will be hosting a couple of qualifiers for the Colorado Open.  We don't get the opportunity to showcase our facility too many times a year, so we take extra care when we do get the opportunity.  Many of the details we focus on will likely go unnoticed by most people, but give a finished look to the course we take such pride in. 

Things like edging drain basins, sprinklers, and yardage plaques often take a backseat to other more basic maintenance tasks, but with a full staff that is operating efficiently we can knock them out pretty quickly.
If the weather holds off, we should have things looking really good for Colorado Open hopefuls.

Nursery Update

 About a week ago we seeded the "1/4" Nursery" as we call it.  The prep consisted of killing off the native grass, mowing it down to 1" a couple directions and rototilling multiple directions incorporating our in house compost to amend the soil.  After about 4 days of light and frequent irrigation cycles and warm sunny days, much of the seed popped.  On the 4th of July we added a celebratory shot of 19-25-5 fertilizer to get things going.  We will continue irrigating only to keep the soil moist, save a couple days a week to allow for a tidy roll.  Hopefully by the end of the week it should be ready for another roll and then a mowing.  As the roots begin to take hold, we will topdress it by hand to continue smoothing the surface and slowly scale back the irrigation.  Our goal is to have it grown in by the end of the month, so we can harvest sod from it this fall.  We have a quite a few new tees to build in the next year, so the sooner we can begin, the better. 

As luck would have it, a few nights after we seeded, a sprinkler on the hill above the Nursery blew up and washed a nice portion of new seedlings out.  We will reseed this area, along with the rest of the nursery at a lighter rate to fill in the voids.  We erred a little on the light side with our seed rate, so lesson learned for next time when we have stripped sod off and have to start over. 

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.         



Mowing Schedule

I thought it would be a good idea to lay out our mowing schedules now that we are close to fully staffed and the course is actively growing.  

We typically mow greens 7 days a week, but this year we are skipping a mowing once a week in place of a roll.  In an attempt to reduce stress (yes mowing is in fact a stress and physiologically detrimental to the grass plant) we will roll greens instead of mowing to give our greens a little bit of a break from the daily grind (pun intended).  Research has shown that rolling greens instead of a mowing, can maintain green speeds for that "Off" day when greens are not mowed.  This is provided that greens are rolled consistently in conjunction with a  mowing for the remainder of the week.  We can realize significant savings in manpower, fuel, and most importantly turf health by giving our greens a day off.  Most of us have at least one day off a week, shouldn't our greens get the same break?  When we have numbers, we hand cut our greens with Toro 1000's, and when we are short staffed, a riding "triplex" Toro 3150 does the trick just fine.  Many say that a riding greens mower cannot provide the precision cut of a walk mower, and while we would prefer to walk mow every day, in the shoulder season the triplex is far more efficient and frees up bodies to complete other tasks.

We mow TCA (read: Tees, Collars, and Approaches) 3 times per week as long as growth dictates we must.  We us a triplex mower similar to that used for greens set at 1/4", only our TCA mowers have 3 wheel drive, allowing them to maneuver through some of our steep banks without some much as a slip.

Fairways are treated much the same as TCA, on an "as needed" basis, which typically equates to 3 times per week as well.  We use a Toro 4150 typically set at 9/16".  These are much larger machines and far more powerful than the triplexes, sporting five cutting decks instead of three, and large diesel engines instead of gas power V-twins.  

We have discussed our Step Cut in previous posts, but for this task we utilize and oldie, but a goody the John Deere 2653 trim mower.  In 1993, this very machine was one of two that mowed seemingly around the clock, all 45 acres of rough here at Legacy Ridge.  Kudos to Jim our Equipment Manager for keeping this beast going for 18 years.  We typically mow 9 holes of step cut per day, every day of the week, equating to 2-3 mowing's per week.  This machine is somewhere between a triplex and a fairway mower in size and power, but is set to a modest 7/8" all year long.

Rough is a whole other beast itself.  We can't seem to mow rough enough times in a given week (typically twice, with certain areas cut three times).  Just when we seem to have caught up, another surge of growth keeps us scrambling to catch up.  We operate two different machines for rough, assigned to two distinct areas of the course.

First our Toro 4700D is a very large, 7 deck rotary mower which mows all of the large rough areas between tees and greens at 2 inches.  This machine has a 12.5 ft swath and would cut most home lawns in two passes, along with a great deal of shrubbery and mulch if not careful...

Second, for smaller areas around greens and tees we operate a Toro 3500D Sidewinder, also set at 2".  This machine has 3 rotary decks, each identical to the seven decks on the 4700, only these can move 24" to the right or left of center to reach down steep banks, or to prevent the tire rutting from following the same path over and over.  Both of these machines are usually out first thing in the morning and don't get a break until it's time to go home for the day.

The rough mowers are typically the only large mowers you will see out on the course during the day.  We try to perform all other daily mowing in the early morning hours before play begins.  If you come upon a rough mower during your round, they will acknowledge that they see you and move out of the line of play.  They almost always have a great deal of mowing to complete that day and will try to provide a minimal distraction to you as you complete your round.

We will discuss further in later posts other equipment and machinery the turf staff utilize on a daily basis to keep our beloved course in tip-top shape for our guests.

Ballmarks

Since we are well into the golf season, it is fitting to touch on a very, if not the most important piece of golf etiquette in our minds, repairing ball marks.  Every golfer at some point has experienced the frustration of numerous unrepaired ball marks in their line as they prepare to make a putt.  Their frustration is shared by our staff as well, primarily because it shows a lack of respect for the golf course and other players.
 
The turf staff spends on average about 2-3 minutes per green each day repairing ball marks that were either repaired incorrectly, or not repaired at all.  This is part of preparing the course every morning for play, but from that time until the next morning it is the responsibility of our guests.  We would prefer to spend that time fixing ball marks where an attempt was made, as opposed to unrepaired ball marks.

It is important to repair them before we mow so that they heal properly and to prevent any of the severe ball marks from being scalped.  When you add up the time spent repairing ball marks in a given week it adds up to over 6 hours spent just repairing ball marks, per week!!  Please don't think of the turf staff when repairing ball marks, but the players who come after you, as their round is better thanks to your efforts.  Here is a video the USGA created on this topic.

The video may seem cheesy, but the points illustrated are very important in maintaining a high quality putting surface. Thank you very much for your cooperation.



    

Safety First

Apparently we have entered the monsoon season a little early this year...  We set out this morning to verticut and topdress greens and were successful until we reached #15 green, when we were stopped by lightning and rain.  We will finish the remaining greens first thing tomorrow morning assuming the inclement weather has concluded.  What is already a fairly messy process quickly can become a disaster when bad weather is thrown into the equation.   Not only that, for safety reasons we bring the crew into the shop any time there is lighting in the area, without exception.  While this throws a wrench into our plans for the day, it is a perfect opportunity to hold an impromptu safety meeting.

Most of our staff was hiding behind the camera

We typically hold safety meetings every two weeks during peak staff levels, each with a unique topic.  With our efforts this morning suspended by lightning, it was only fitting to discuss lighning safety.  We explain to all staff that we expect them to head in to the shop as soon as they see lightning and make sure any other employees are directed in as well.  Colorado is #2 in the US for lightning strikes behind only Florida, so it is very important that we take any lightning seriously.  

We have compiled information and literature relevant to all of our topics that is accessible to all staff members at any time.  Future topics include:  Equipment safety, Emergency preparedness, Back safety, Snow safety, Heat precautions, Flammables, Reclaimed Water.  Every safety meeting contains reminders of course etiquette, policies, and our PPE requirements (Personal Protective Equipment).  Ordinarily meetings are held during our morning staff meeting, or at the end of the work day, but if weather affords us a free moment, we take advantage.  Much of what we discuss is within the realm of common sense, but a refresher is always important to keep everyone sharp on our safety expectations and policies.  Thanks to Andy and D-Mu for planning and executing our safety meetings for the year.