Course Notes, 10/18/16

As the picture above illustrates, fall is finally upon us and the foliage is starting to show its true color.  The next 10-14 days will truly have some spectacular views.  Hopefully many of you will have the opportunity to come out and enjoy your golf course.

Aerification has been completed on greens and fairways, and I thank my staff for their hard work in the last 10 days.  With the ample rainfall and above normal temperatures, healing of the aerification holes is already ahead of schedule compared to past years.

We have also began some of our preparations of the greens for this coming winter, a bit earlier than we normally do.  Below are some of what we do to best defend the turf against the harsh conditions winter can sometimes bring.

Raising mower heights.  One of the changes I have made this year is raising the height of cut on the greens earlier than normal.  Currently,the height of cut on greens .135", or .015" higher than in-season heights.  Raising height of cut allows more leaf surface for the turf to maximize their photosynthetic capabilities and carbohydrate storage.  Raising height will also lessen stress to the plant and create a deeper root system going into winter.  While raising heights may not create the speeds that summer brings, it is best for the long term health of the greens going into winter.

Late Season deep tine channels

Late season aerification.  On November 7th, our annual Vertidrain process will completed (weather permitting!).  These extra holes create three advantages:  additional channels for spring root growth, aid in relieving any deeper compaction within the rootzone soil profile, and extra drainage capabilities for ice/snow melt to prevent ice formation on the plant surfaces.  These tines are 1/2" wide, and vary in depth from 7-10".  The depth of these tines is altered each year to prevent a hardpan layer from forming, which would hinder drainage over time.

Fertility and Plant Protectants.  While we limit nutrients on finely maintained turf during the season to provide great playing conditions, the fall is the best time to feed the turf to maximize carbohydrate storage going into winter.  The more carbs the plant stores, the quicker it will break dormancy when temperatures warm up in the spring.  Nitrogen, potassium, and bio stimulants were applied to fill this vital need over the course of the month.  Plant protectants will be applied to prevent damage from fungal diseases such as Pink Snow Mold.

Topdressing protecting the crown of the plants

Topdressing.  Another change to our winterization program will be more light, frequent applications of topdressing sand while the turf is still actively growing.  This will help further even out the playing surfaces from aerification and begin the process of protecting the crown from winter's cold and ice.  When growth has ceased for the year, we will apply a thick coating of sand topdressing to bury the crowns and as much leaf tissue as possible.  This sand helps protect and insulate the crown of the plant from any extreme cold temperatures.  This practice was another way more damage was prevented from the ice layer that encased all the greens turf in 2014.

Our 2nd assistant Kyle removing bluegrass sod

Finally, the staff and I began one of our major fall projects today.  We will be installing an extended collar to the back of 9 green, thanks to much input and feedback from many of you.  This is also a suggested improvement from our golf course architect, Shawn Smith of Hills/Forrest.  The idea is to give more options for shots behind the green and make that area of the hole a bit less penal.  As the pictures dictate, we will be removing 6-7 feet of the bluegrass sod and replacing it with bentgrass from our in-house nursery.  We should have all the sod laid by week's end.

Bentgrass sod being installed

Going forward, while #9 will be open for play, this area will be roped off for the rest of the playing season.  We will be rolling, aerifying, and topdressing the sod to smooth this surface into a playable surface for the 2017 season.  This area should be treated as Ground Under Repair and shots should not be taken from this new area.  Thank you for your cooperation with this nice improvement to #9.


If you have any questions, please contact me at ryan@elconacc.com.  Thank you, and I hope to see you out on the golf course!

Ryan

Course Update, 1/11/2016

3 Pond in its Winter State

Winter has finally arrived, and some of the coldest air of the season has invaded our area.  I wanted to take a minute and share some of my observations over the last 4 weeks.

18 green receiving a mow on 12/9/15

Mowing fairways on December 22. Quite shaggy!

Clipping yield from 18 green, 12/9/15

December brought record warmth to our area.  The green and fairway turf was mowed and plant protectants were reapplied in those areas.  The decision to do this is not a easy, cut and dry one to make, but one that was necessary IMO for the long term health of the turf.  Growth regulators were included in the reapplication to minimize growth in case the warm weather continued, which it did for a bit, albeit not the 60's we saw earlier in the month.  As of this morning, all areas are clean of disease.

Topdressing 18 green

1 green after sand was applied

The warm December allowed us to continue adding topdressing to greens to continue to protect the crowns from any cold injury due to exposure.  It also kept the soil from freezing, which was key for any rain events we received over the course of the month.  A great example is over this past weekend, when the course received 1.75" of rain Friday and Saturday.  Thanks in part to the unfrozen soil, open holes from our November deep tine aerification, and a late season wetting agent application that aids in moving water away from the soil surface, all surfaces were dry before the temperatures dropped and any standing water could freeze.  Remembering our ice adventures from a couple of years ago, I was quite happy to see that!   The dangers of ice to Poa annua greens and our experiences are explained here and here to refresh your memory.  

#5 after this past weekend's weather event

No ice, just a dusting of snow on green surfaces

17 Green

With temperatures now forecasted to be below normal, additional snow cover would be highly beneficial to further insulate the crowns of the plants.  Poa annua is resilient, but susceptible to deep cold injury.  While it is "so far, so good" in regards to turf survival over the winter, the situation is one that will be continuously monitored and sampled.

If you have any questions, contact me at ryan@elconacc.com.  Stay warm!

Ryan

November Course Notes and Happenings

While the leaf colors exceeded beauty and expectations, they are dropping as fast as we can mulch them.  As I sit in my office on this frosty morning, I estimate we are about 70% done with this quite time consuming process.  The contrast in colors this time of year between turf and leaves are spectacular though!  Here's hoping that we have a few days this month for all of you to come out and enjoy the golf course.

The Vertidrain process on #9

Our contractor was out on November 2nd to Vertidrain our greens.  This process is a solid tine aerification that reaches a depth of 8-9 inches.  The benefits of this late season process is to create channels for new root growth and late fall/early spring drainage.  This process also further smoothed the greens from October's core aerification, and we applied an additional 20 tons of sand as well to fill in any open areas.

Map of Indiana's Drought status, as of 10/27/15

A few of you were asking why the October core aerification was slow to heal this year.  There are a few reasons why our greens are slower to heal perhaps compared to other courses in the area, no matter the frequency we roll them or amount of fertilizer or water we apply.  One major reason is that the turf composition on the greens are 80-90% Poa annua, whose growth habit is non-spreading, unlike Creeping Bentgrass, which is the main turf composition on tees and fairways here. The other major factor is the schedule of timing of this necessary practice.  October soil temperatures are 15-20 degrees on average below those of September, and we lose over 90 minutes of daylight over the course of the month.  The 2 mornings where the low was below freezing really slowed down both the metabolism and growth rate of the plant!  Finally, October was quite the dry month here, where most of Elkhart County is considered now in a moderate drought situation.  Rain water is 10x more acidic than our irrigation water, and that increased acidity makes additional nutrients available to the plant in the soil. Hopefully this provides a bit of agronomic reasoning behind the healing process and its timing.  If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact me either at 574-295-6374 or by email at ryan@elconacc.com.  I am more than happy to discuss anything golf course related!

We do have a couple of small projects that the staff and I have or will be starting this month, along with beginning our annual tree work.  The first project involved the cart path entry at 10 green.  All of you have noticed the poor turf conditions that exist at the beginning of that path due to the heavy traffic from both maintenance equipment and golf carts.  What we did here is utilize old rubber matting from Chef Casey's kitchen and placed it at the main entry point, then covered it with a soil/seed mixture.  The thought here is to allow the mat to absorb the brunt of the weight associated with the traffic and allow for increased turf density and vigor there.  The seed will germinate next year and we will use this area as an experiment that hopefully will allow us to learn how to better manage these areas.

Mats placed in hole below turf surface

Poor turf and soil removed at entry point

Seed/soil mix filled on top for new turf

We also are building a new forward tee on the right side of #2, just before the beginning of the fairway.  The new tee will measure 320 yards to the center of the green.  The white tees will then move permanently where the forward tees are located currently.  I will have more information and pictures on this project later this month.



Ryan

A Good Brisk Walk

 One of the more enjoyable aspects of my job is taking a brisk walk around the golf course just taking in all that I can observe.  Besides tricking my body into exercise, it allows me to better look at things closer than I can driving around in a utility vehicle.  Last week provided me with that first opportunity at Elcona.  I liked what I saw, considering the harsh winter Mother Nature dolled out across the region.  We have work to do, but I like our position compared to the other possibilities if we had not taken the measures we did.

Close up of open aerification holes

8 green enjoying some sunlight

The vast majority of the turf on greens is in great shape. Our snow and ice removal plans worked to eliminate toxic gases from suffocating the turf.  The plants also were still hardy enough to survive the cold temperatures that came after removal.  Finally, thanks to having such a wonderful, dedicated staff, we kept up in managing the melting water from re-freezing on the turf and creating crown hydration injury.  The picture above right shows another reason why we were able to eliminate as much standing water on the greens.  The late season aerification Greg and his staff performed left open holes in the soil profile for the water to drain into, once the ground thawed out a bit.  A couple of low areas suffered some crown hydration injury, but samples pulled from those areas showed growth and recovery after warming up in the shop for a couple of days.

5 green

The picture of 5 green shows that we did have some superficial damage from our removal last month.  In moving slush and water off of the green profile, there was a fair amount of sand mixed in with it.  That sand worked like sandpaper on a piece of wood, and caused some bruising of leaf tissue due to its abrasive nature.  All of the sample plugs I have pulled out of this area have recovered, after a couple of days of warmth.  It may look bad right now, but there is a fair amount of green leaf tissue underneath and the crowns are healthy still.

Front right of 9 green

Another example of winter injury I have observed is desiccation, and the picture on the left shows some on 9 green. This is a high point on the golf course and historically gets wind burnt and especially dry as the winter goes.  Once again, the sample I pulled from this area greened up and started growing within a day or two inside.  Once again, it looks bad but no real worries here!

Shovel marks on the front left of 10 green

Finally, I have included a picture of area damage that we did in an effort to remove the thick ice that had accumulated on a couple greens.  While it may look real bad, these will go away and fill in as the temperatures increase.  We will be rolling a bit more in the next week, and lightly topdressing these areas to further smooth out and repair them.  Some areas will need some plugs from our greens nursery to repair turf that was damaged by the snow removal equipment, and our staff will be acting on that quickly as well.



Over the next week, conditions will improve even more, and we will be able to begin our mowing and rolling routines on the golf course.  Golf is near, and I could not be more excited to get the 2014 season started.  I appreciate your patience and understanding while we get the golf course back into shape following the historic winter it experienced.  In my mind, we experienced unprecedented conditions and had to take aggressive steps to prevent a more catastrophic result from happening. 

Ryan