Course Update 5/30/19

Another .85" of rain fell last night bringing our two day total to 4.25".  Fortunately, no additional washouts occurred and there wasn't any hail.  I mentioned in yesterday's post that our progress of repairing Grove greens was halted due to afternoon storms, so we finished those greens first thing this morning then turned to Lakes.  The overall process went much smoother today with everyone knowing their role, even with a few rain delays.  We ended up finishing Lakes greens in a rain storm and I am pleased to report that all the greens completed today achieved the same great results as yesterday.  Orchard greens are scheduled for tomorrow and I don't anticipate any issues as long as the weather cooperates.

In addition to repairing the greens, six staff members spent all day repairing the greenside bunkers on Grove and Lakes.  Pushing the wet, heavy sand up is a tedious job and the staff did a great job given the current conditions.  We will repair the fairway bunkers on Grove and Lakes tomorrow ahead of the tournament, along with touching up some of the greenside bunkers that need additional work.

Here's a closeup of our greens aerifier.  The machine has a 48" working width with six independent coring heads and four different forward spacing options.  This current setup uses sixty .25" solid pencil tines that will penetrate 3-4" into the rootzone.  These smaller tines will only last nine holes before wearing out enough that they cannot reach our desired depth so we usually install new ones after each nine is completed.  A complete set of new tines averages $500 after freight and tax.

Grove 8 fairway bunker washed out again after being cleaned up yesterday.

Every time our bunkers washout the sand becomes more contaminated with rocks and sediment from the surrounding native soil.

Hail damage on Grove 4 green Wednesday morning.

Grove 4 green this morning after completing all cultural practices.  The cup is in the same spot as yesterday.

Course Update 5/29/19

Last night's storms delivered 3.4" of heavy rain and nearly golf ball sized hail, washing out bunkers and leaving plenty of debris to cleanup today.  It was some of the hardest rain I have seen in years, and the sound of the hail was like standing next to a passing train.  We found ourselves saying "It could have been a lot worse" many times today as we assessed the property.  Yes, we are dealing with hail damaged greens, all the bunkers need to be repaired, and there is enough debris throughout the courses to keep us busy for days, but we didn't lose any trees and there weren't any landslides.

Repairing the hail damaged greens is our primary focus and we determined that combining numerous cultural practices delivered the best results.  All 29 greens received some sort of damage from the hail, but Grove got it the worst and that's where we started after completing the practice green.  The first step in the process is to verticut (or vertical mow) which removes leaf tissue, thatch, and Poa seedheads, leaving 1/16" wide grooves for sand to settle into.  Next, we mow the greens at their normal height perpendicular to the verticut direction to clean up any stray leaf tissue.  After mowing, we sand topdress the greens then aerify using .25" solid tines on a 1.5"x1.5" spacing.  This type of aerification, also called pencil tining, helps to work the sand into the turf and the movement of the tines being pulled out of the ground will pull up the depression left by the hail.  The final steps in the process are to drag the greens with a semi-coarse brush to evenly spread the sand across the putting surface and fill in any remaining hail damaged spots, followed by rolling to smooth any bumps and tire tracks.  More storms this afternoon interrupted our progress on Grove, but we'll finish tomorrow morning then turn to Lakes followed by Orchard.  We are very pleased with the final results on the greens thus far and plan to have the process completed by Friday morning as long as the weather cooperates.

Large piece of hail from yesterday's storms.

Hail damage on Grove 4 green.

This was typical of the debris encountered this morning.

All the bunkers washed out and will be repaired once the sand dries out and can be pushed back into place.

Lakes 7 pond near the drop area.

There was enough water flowing in this creek to push a large rock into the drain pipe and collapse part of the wing wall. 

Lakes #5 by the tees.

Lakes #5 by the green.  You can see how high the water got from where the log and debris line is above the pipe.  The log is close to 18" in diameter.

This is the putting green surface after verticutting.

Sand topdressing then aerifying gave the best results.

Here's a closeup of the putting surface right after aerifying.

This is the putting surface after brushing and rolling.  The aerifier holes aren't visible anymore.

The end result repairs the hail damage and makes for a great putting surface.

Course Update 5/23/19

Fairway aerification took place this week after postponing for over a month due to weather delays.  The same contractor was used during previous aerifications and all 27 holes were completed over four days (the fourth day was required due to rain on Thursday).  Because we only closed 9 holes per day the contractor didn't need as much equipment, but still used three tractors, two large aerifiers, and one recycling machine with a total value of $180,000.  They charge us $270 per acre to core aerify and recycle the plugs which comes out to $10,800 for our 40 acres of fairway.  The aerifiers were setup with hollow tines that removed a 3/4" diameter core 4" deep, which created 20 holes per square foot.  That equates to 34,848,000 holes across all the fairways.  That may seem like a lot of holes, but it only affected 5% of the total surface area.

Aerification is an important and necessary practice in providing great playing conditions.  CLICK HERE to learn more about the process and why we do it.

The contractor is coring Grove 1 fairway with the large aerifiers that have a 98" working width.

The maintenance staff uses a small, 30" wide aerifier around irrigation heads, yardage markers and drains to prevent damage by the larger aerifiers.

Once the plugs (cores) dry out enough they are broken up with two heavy steel drag mats that go over every fairway several times.  The goal is to separate the soil from the organic matter (thatch) so the soil can be worked back into the holes.

Once the fairways are dragged the contractor uses a recycling machine to pulverize the soil and thatch into finer pieces.

The debris on the surface of this fairway is thatch that was left after the recycling process.

The final step in the process is for the maintenance staff to blow the thatch and any remaining debris off the fairways and then clean off irrigation heads, yardage markers and drains.

This is an aerification plug from one of the fairways and gives you an idea of how much thatch we have.  The total length of the plug was close to 4", but some of the soil fell off prior to taking the picture.  There's approximately 1.75" of thatch which is considered excessive, and why our fairways feel spongy and tend to stay wet longer.

Course Update 5/16/19

This week we started a drainage project to the right of Lakes #6 green along the woods.  This has always been a wet area, but this spring it has gotten worse.  We originally thought it was an irrigation leak, but that was ruled out by confirming the pipe was down by the cart path and turning the water off for over a week didn't make a difference.  We then inquired with the township about a possible leak in their water line along the road behind the green, but that was also ruled out.  We ultimately concluded the problem was caused by natural springs and water runoff onto the golf course due to the record rainfall last year and continuation this spring.  Once digging began we discovered an old drain line running along the woods that obviously hasn't worked in years due to the amount of mud and tree roots packed in it.  Our plan is to continue digging to remove the old drain line and soil back towards the bronze tee and fill the trench with a new double-wall pipe and clean gravel.  Any surface or ground water will be intercepted by the drain, which will keep the bottom of the approach and surrounding rough dry and playable.

View from behind Lakes #6 green.  The excess water has been accumulating under the new rough sod and bottom of the approach, making them unplayable.

Using plywood under the excavator to keep it from getting stuck in the saturated conditions.

Here's the old drainage pipe we found while digging.  The pipe is full of mud and tree roots, and unable to flow water.

There was a little gravel on top of the old drain line, but the surface water couldn't get through the 6" layer of muck that had developed over the years.

The open trench is already collecting water and the grass to the left of the trench is starting to dry out.

Course Update 5/9/19

We received measurable rainfall the first five days this month amounting to 0.85", but fortunately the past four days have been warm and dry.  I can't remember the last time we had four days in a row without rain and we took advantage of the weather this week to get caught up on numerous maintenance tasks.  This most important one this time of year is mowing and blowing rough, and we'll have the mowers going again this weekend as long as the weather allows.  We also made our scheduled fungicide and nutrient applications to greens and fairways, along with fertilizing tees.  These types of applications are planned over the winter to maximize the health of the turf and reduce the potential for disease outbreaks.  A delayed, or missed application can have negative results that may last all summer.

In addition to our regular maintenance activities we spent some time fixing the drain line on Orchard #8 upper fairway that continued to wash out.  The drainage contractor was here for two afternoons digging out the edges of the trench that had collapsed and removing the leaves and soil that had accumulated on top of the pipe.  They then backfilled with several inches of clean gravel, followed by a sand/soil blend up to the fairway surface that was approximately six inches deep and compacted everything.  To avoid future erosion issues, we decided to sod over the drain lines in the fairway to minimize the large volumes of surface water that would run into the trench and wash the gravel and sand out.  Now during heavy rains, the surface water will stay on top of the turf and run down the hill at the end of the fairway and into the pond.  There is still a little more work to do on the lateral drain line, and we anticipate having it finished in a day or two.

The contractor started the repair process by digging out the collapsed sides to expose the drain line and gravel.

Fresh gravel was installed over the pipe then a blend of sand/soil was used to backfill up the fairway surface and compacted.

We then ran our sod cutter over the compacted sand to remove the old turf and square up the edges, thereby making it easier to install new sod.

The lower portion of the drain line from the wye down to the end of the fairway is complete in this pic, and we had time to finish the left side of the "V".  The right side, or lateral line, will be finished in the next day or two.

Here's a shot from the end of Orchard #8 upper fairway looking up towards the fairway bunker.  We had enough material and were able to re-sod small worn areas in the cleanup pass.

Course Update 5/2/19

We closed out the month of April with 3.84" of rain, or .83" above the monthly average.  Over the first four months this year we've received 12.16" of liquid precipitation, or 1.22" above our year to date average.  We were hoping for a drier spring, but seem to be caught in a similar wet-weather pattern from last year.  Our chronic wet spots have returned and we've adjusted our maintenance schedule accordingly.  That includes more walk-mowing of tees and approaches, and using smaller (lighter) rough and fairway mowers.  The smaller equipment is gentler on the wet turf, but we lose productivity since the smaller mowers don't cover as much ground as the larger equipment.  To compensate for the lower productivity we're working more hours when the weather allows.

Push mowing new sod around Lakes greens and conducting springtime bunker maintenance (edging, weeding, moving sand).

Last of the fairway topdressing sand being loaded.  All fairways were topdressed this week with some problem areas receiving a double application.

Located and dug up the drain line for the bunkers on Grove 8 green that holds water after a heavy rain.  It was a lot deeper than we thought (about 2.5'), partially crushed and filled with tree roots.  Normally we would dig up the old line and install a new one, but it runs under the cart path.

Here's the section of drain line we cut out from the above picture.  Notice the root mass that is blocking most of the pipe.  We're going to use a special drain cleaning machine that will cut up the roots and allow us to flush them out with water so we don't have to dig through the cart path.