Tuesday, April 27, 2010

April Course Update

It's quite unusual for April but it's actually been a nice, relatively dry, month and with this we've made very good progress on a variety of routine tasks, special maintenance tasks, and improvement projects. With all that is happening right now, it feels more like June than April!  A list of our activities includes:
  • Completion of deep tine fairway aeration.
  • Completion of overseeding of winter injured fairways.
  • Topdressing of greens (2x) and approaches.
  • Topdressing and solid tine aeration of fairways No.s 3, 11, 13, (No. 4 to be completed tomorrow)
  • Aeration and overseeding of thin (shaded or high traffic) areas in rough.
  • Establishing shorter cut walk paths, or "dew paths", in the tee descents leading from tee to fairway.
  • Interceptor drainage channels installed at cart path adjacent to No. 18 green.
  • Continued installation of brick edging and crushed brick at No. 12 green / No. 13 tee.
  • In process of constructing extensions of tees No. 10 and No. 17.
  • & Routine mowing, trimming, bunker raking, debris removal, plant protectant applications (seedhead suppression, nutrient, weed control, disease prevention) , drain and sprinkler head edging, and much more!
A glimpse of our current activities is shown in the following photos:
Javier spreading mixture of sand, peat and bentgrass seed...

into prepared (shallow, solid tine aerated ) winter damaged areas

Miguel spreading crushed brick over fabric covered, brick edged, gravel underlayment

Shaping of subgrade and layout of Championship tee #10

Topdressing approach at #13

Rafa aerating topdressed fairway #3 - process aids incorporation of sand and provides usual benefits of aeration

Jacob putting final touches of incorporation process with drag broom

Approx. 3/8 - 1/2" layer of sand from triple fall and first spring application - a good start!

Topdressing and manually brooming fairway expansion on #8 Approach

Willow at far end of range - victim of high wind last Saturday eve.

Blue Jay enjoying new temporary perch!

More details on our winter injury recovery efforts, tee construction, fairway topdressing, additional course etiquette posts, and much more will be forthcoming.

    Monday, April 12, 2010

    Course Etiquette #1 - Ball Mark Repair - It's Every Players Responsibility!

    This is the first post in a series I'm planning regarding Course Etiquette. I want to start with the ever so important - Repairing Ball Marks.

    Ball marks, those indentations caused when a ball lands sharply on a green, softened by rain or high humidity, have been ruining good putts since the days of Old Tom Morris. Unrepaired ball marks take two to three weeks to properly heal, leaving behind unsightly, uneven putting surfaces. On the other hand, a repaired ball mark only takes half that time to heal.

    Beginner or pro, it is your responsibility as a golfer to fix your own marks. If you're truly a steward of the game, you'll fix any others you see while your partners are putting. There's really not much to it, but there are a few guidelines you should follow when making these repairs.

    Four Steps to Properly Repairing a Ball Mark
    1.Select a pronged ball mark repair tool, pocket knife, or tee.


    2.Insert it at the edges of the mark--not the middle of the depression.
     
     

    3. Bring the edges together with a gentle twisting motion, but don't lift the center. 
    Try not to tear the grass.
     
     4. Smooth the surface with your putter by lightly tamping. 
    You're done when it's a surface you would want to putt over!

    If we all do our part and repair ball marks as soon as we make them, they'll heal quickly, the greens will look better and, more importantly, the surfaces will be smoother and give you a better chance at dropping that next putt! 
    Photos and portions of text in this post courtesy of the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America (GCSAA)

    Sunday, April 4, 2010

    80 Degrees on April 1st - No April Fool's Joke!

    It's official. Thursday, April 1st, Chicago set a record high temperature of 83 degrees for the date, and here at Skokie CC our weather station recorded 82.85, to be exact! No fooling about it! It was truly a beautiful day, the first time the mercury has risen this high in over six months, and a day that helps us forget for the moment, the long, cold, icy winter. It was only the 12th time in over 140 years of recordings that the temperature has been this high, this early in the year. And it was just in time for the re-opening of the club! We've had the course and regular greens open for the past few weeks but with all areas of the club now back in full operation, carts are available, and the range and chipping area is open for use!

    Every day we make continued progress on the course with spring clean-up, bunker preparation, placing course furnishings (ball washers, benches, etc.) as well as initiating routine daily tasks such as mowing (greens, tees, approaches, fairways, intermediate rough), and course set-up (changing hole locations and tee markers).

    In addition to these items we've been busy with repair efforts on the winter damaged areas on the greens (fortunately not many) and the fairways (unfortunately a few more than we'd like). On the greens this work involved the use of a manually operated spot overseeder known as the German Tamp, then dropping bentgrass seed throughout the affected area and into the numerous, small, shallow dimples created by the Tamp, then lightly topdressing with green dyed sand (the dark color helps absorb some heat from the sun) and finally lightly brooming to smooth the sand and help seed nestle into the dimples.
    On the fairways we use our motorized 4' wide aerator equipped with multiple, solid, pencil sized tines, set to (as with the greens) create numerous, shallow channels for seed to lodge, germinate, and be protected during the early seedling phase. There are numerous small areas throughout the fairways, and some relatively larger areas on #8 fairway. All winter injured areas on greens are already complete, as is #8 fairway, and we will continue to address all affected fairway areas next week.
    A combination of warmer weather, and a little moisture (which we received Sat.morn.and Sun. eve), will not only help our fall applied nutrients to activate for turf availability and help existing turf spread into voids, but also will provide the necessary conditions for our seeding efforts, aiding rapid germination and seedling development.

    Operating Spot Overseeder

    Ready for seed, and green-dyed sand

    Operating fairway aerator with multiple, solid, mini-tines
     Fairway damaged area, aerated and ready for seed

    In addition to the winter damage repair / overseeding work above, we're also in the process of deep tine aerating all fairways. In this process we use solid tines (no soil cores extracted)which creates deep channels (approx. 8-9") with diameters of 3/4" and 1/2". These channels help break up compacted soil, improve drainage, enhance rooting, improve oxygen and gas exchange, improve nutrient movement, and generally enhance plant health. The following video shows this operation, Verti-drain aeration, in process.

    Fairway Deep Tine, Verti-drain Aeration
    Deep Tine - Verti-drain Aeration channels

    I'll keep you posted as to our progress with these and many more activities about to unfold. See you on the course!

    Monday, March 29, 2010

    Native Grass / Naturalized Grass Burn

    Over the past two weeks weather conditions have been conducive to our annual practice of controlled burning of our Native / Naturalized Tall Grass areas. The exact timing of when we conduct this process is always somewhat unknown as of course precipitation has a significant impact on the burn-ability of these grasses and thoroughness of the burn. Recently, though, weather has cooperated (except for a wind shift that occurred and unfortunately sent smoke in an unwanted direction!) and allowed us to nearly complete this task.

    I prefer to burn in the spring each year for two primary reasons. First the dried grasses, especially the true native grasses like Little Blue-stem, Indian Grass, and Switch Grass, remain upright throughout the winter adding landscape interest during this stark season. Secondly, withholding the burn until spring, the grasses, both native and naturalized (the term we use to refer to tall grass areas of non-native fescues, orchard grass, timothy, and other species of European origin) provide protective habitat for wildlife during the long cold winter.

    As listed in last years Prairie Fire post (click on Tall Grass under Blog Topics) there are several benefits to Controlled Burning:
    • Reduces the large mass of dried plant material. Much more cost effective compared to mowing, raking, hauling, disposing, and much more thorough.
    • Clears the plant canopy so new grasses can grow without competition.
    • Improves the quality of the re-emerging plant species and aids new plant seed germination.
    • Reduces tree seedlings, annual grasses, and weed encroachment.
    • Prevents the accidental ignition by a discarded cigarette / cigar.
    • Burned ash returns plant nutrients and organic matter to the soil aiding new growth.
    • Burned black ash absorbs the suns energy and warms the soil speeding re-growth. (The very deep root systems are unaffected by the flame or heat and underground shoots re-emerge when the soil warms)
    • Devoid areas provide habitat for wildlife such as the nesting Killdeer birds.

     Starting a fire line on the Native Grass mound at #12

    Dried Indian Grass, Little Blue-stem, & Switch Grass, burn rapidly and intensely! 

    Typical charred remains - ready to absorb sun's rays and begin growth anew

    After a spring rain or two the ash and blackened remains will dissipate and before long new green shoots will emerge and begin to flourish. 




    Saturday, March 27, 2010

    Tree Management Activities

    In an earlier post this year I mentioned that our annual pruning activities were underway. (See Annual Pruning Activities - Mar. 2)  Well I'm happy to now report that the aerial work is complete, nearly all of the branches have been removed from the course, and most of the remnant debris has been raked clean.  Hundreds of trees were pruned throughout the course over a two week period and the result is improved canopy structure, reduced chance of hazardous/dead branch fall, reduced incidence of disease through sanitation pruning, improved light penetration for the underlying turf, and overall improved health and appearance. Our remaining task now is the chipping of the branches stockpiled at various locations around the course.

    In addition to this annual pruning we also have begun to address an additional tree management activity, that of tree removal. As I mentioned in the Mar. 2nd post and last year as well (click on Tree Management under Blog Topics to see all posts) we follow a set of criteria I call the 5-D's when determining whether a tree warrants removal.


    The 5-D’s that guide our tree removal actions:
    • Diseased - significant infection that is untreatable or too costly to treat.
    • Decayed/Dead - significant decay, or complete death, resulting in structural weakening and hazardous conditions.
    • Damaged - significant structural damage from high winds and/or lightning.
    • Disfigured - Unattractive shape from over crowding of adjacent trees or from damage.
    • Disruptive – Affecting playability. Causing traffic concentration, excess turf loss from shade, root system impacts to turf and drainage tile systems.

    Approximately 25 trees have been identified as having met one or more of the 5-D criteria, more than half of which are spruce trees in groupings at two locations.  The following photos show some of the trees that have been (or will soon be) removed and the criteria reason.

      Spruce (5)- behind alternate tee #12 - Severely Diseased, Disfigured, Disruptive to tee.


    Austrian Pine - #7 berm rt. of tee - Approx. 2/3rds Dead

     Silver Maple - Rt. rough #8 - Severe Canker Disease


     
    Close up of Canker in above photo - causing dieback of canopy


    Red Oak - Lft. rough #17 - Damaged central leader


    Spruce - No. 8 Lft. of green - Diseased, Disfigured


    Spruce (3) -walk path at #9 - Diseased, Damaged, Disruptive

    Arborvitae and Spruce - Lft. edge #9 pond - Damaged, Diseased, Disfigured


    Close up of Arborvitae & Spruce in previous photo showing extensive dieback from Disease


    The above photographs are not all of the removals planned but do represent the majority and the most significant.  In some cases we will replace the removed trees/shrubs, such as in the last photo at #9 pond, where we intend to replant with a combination of clump form ornamental trees (Serviceberry), shrubs (Red-twig Dogwood) and grasses (Indian grass, Little-blue stem) which will provide multiple season interest.

    Saturday, March 20, 2010

    Greens Recovered - Naturally

    How was that for a tease?  Three days of nice temperatures, a welcomed amount of sunshine, a chance to play to the regular greens, and then we wake up this morning to this:

     Hole 14 - Saturday morning 3/20
     I guess after all, it is mid-March and it is Chicagoland! Hopefully this is winters last hurrah and this recent covering is short-lived!

    Thursday, March 18, 2010

    Flagsticks In - Spring Prep Activities

    The regular greens are now open and ready for play!
     This morning we finished rolling all greens, mowed them, set new hole locations, and put in the freshly painted flagsticks. Let the season begin!    
     Greens Open!

    A few players took advantage of the nice day today, and it looks like tomorrow should be nice as well, but the forecast for the weekend and early next week looks a little bleak so it's likely we will be recovering the greens soon. It takes a crew of about 8 men, approx. 4-41/2 hours, to put the covers on, so if the forecast stands we'll start recovering early tomorrow afternoon. I mentioned the reasons why we do this in the previous post but in general we don't want to have a decline in the benefits that the covers provide.

    It was a very busy day today on the grounds at SCC. The photo's below show our activities:

    First greens rolling complete

    First greens mowing complete

    All fairways rolled to prepare for mowing

    Aeration of shaded, saturated, ice damaged area on #8 fairway
    (fortunately this is only fairway with larger areas of injury)

     Controlled burning of native & naturalized grass areas begin
    More details on several of these above projects / practices will be forthcoming.



    Wednesday, March 17, 2010

    Covers Off - Greens look, well,...Green!

    With the snow gone, ice finally melted, and forecast temperatures mild during the day and above freezing at night, the green covers have now been removed! We now enter a period I call the "cover shuffle" which means we'll leave the covers near the greens and if the nighttime temperatures are forecast to drop below freezing, we'll put them back on. When the nighttime temperatures again reach above freezing, we'll take them back off again. This on and off covering/recovering process will continue until temperatures ultimately moderate.  It's a tedious task, and we always look forward to a long stretch of days/nights where we can keep them off and let them acclimate, but I believe if we don't replace them during these temperature drops, we'll likely have a reduction of some of the benefits the covers provide.
     A Green Cover being removed

    Benefits of Green Covers:
    • Protection against desiccation (drying) in an open winter. (Not a concern this year with extended snow cover!)
    • Protection from animal activity such as deer and geese.  Both tend to dislike covers. 
    • Prevents debris and animal waste (deer, geese, coyote) accumulation over winter.
    • Allows us to perform aeration later into the fall and extend the playing quality of putting surfaces.
    • Provides enhanced green-up and root growth as covers accelerate soil warming. 
    • Helps us achieve smoother, truer, ball roll in an earlier time frame.

    Back of #15 Green - Nice & Green...just in time for St. Patty's Day!

    We began rolling the greens today and we'll likely begin to mow them tomorrow.  Also began rolling fairways to firm them and settle some of the natural frost heaving that occurs when the soil freezes.  More information on all these activities will be posted shortly.
      

    Saturday, March 13, 2010

    A Good Bit O' the Green

    St. Patrick's Day is on Wednesday next week and aside from the usual reasons to celebrate, this year (due to some very favorable developments just this week) there are plenty of additional reasons!

    It's hard to believe but just a few short days ago the course was still blanketed by snow.  We've had a winter with a generous helping of the fluffy white stuff, in fact I believe it's the seventh snowiest on record. With temperatures well into the 50's this week, the blanket is no more.  Snow melted...Reason #1 to celebrate!

     Snow cover on Monday 3/8

    Snow melted by Friday 3/12

    The mostly continuous snow covering this winter has really tested the efficacy and length of protection of our late fall applied plant protectants used to manage snow mold disease activity.  Many areas in the untreated rough have a greater than usual presence of both Typhula and Microdochium fungi, commonly known as, Gray and Pink Snow Mold.  These diseases typically cause foliar blighting but no crown or root damage so recovery will occur from these unaffected plant parts, in a reasonable length of time. Our fall applied nutrients will help accelerate recovery as soon as soil temperatures rise, at which time they will become available for plant uptake. Fortunately, the areas we apply protectants to, the greens, tees, approaches, and fairways,have little to no activity. As with the rough, the amount of disease is more than I've seen in many years (in spite of our treatments) but overall less than many other fellow Agronomists and many Plant Pathologists expected, given the lengthy period of snow cover. Less disease than expected...Reason #2 to celebrate!

     Snow Mold disease fairly prevalent in untreated rough (foreground) but fortunately minimal in green, tee, and fairway areas.

    Along the same lines of continuous snow coverage, a great concern of mine, and many of my colleagues, has been the lengthy covering of ice. You can review our snow and ice removal efforts in my January blog posts which, at the time, were performed at what perhaps could have been the upper limits of time that poa annua (a significant plant species component of our turf) is thought to withstand ice covering or encasement. Since those days back in late January I've been wondering if we would have ice encasement injury on #11 green, one of two greens that was rather severely damaged last year. After "flood melting" the snow off #11 green, and then warm temperatures thawing the soil enough so that we could pull the staples, we were able to turn back the cover for a good look. We're not completely "out of the woods yet" (a sudden drop to sub-freezing temperatures could happen and could result in crown hydration injury) but each passing day brings us closer to spring temperatures and beyond the threat of winter injury.

     Thick (3-4") ice coverage on #11 Green in Dec. & Jan.   
            
     
    Breaking and removing ice on #11 Green 
                              
     The result of our uncovering was a huge sigh of relief as we found very minimal, essentially typical early spring, slight turf discoloration. No apparent ice or other winter injury symptoms...Reason #3 to really Celebrate!

     First uncovering of #11 Green revels little to no winter injury!  

     Another Green (#2) with a Good bit o' green!
    The Luck o' the Irish must be with us! (Along with the luck we created for ourselves with our management practices and products we used to protect our turf this past winter!)  Now let's hope the luck stays with us all summer long, and especially through the Western Amateur Championship!

    Friday, March 12, 2010

    Snow & Ice Washed/Melted Away

    It's hard to believe that just a couple days ago (Tuesday) the course was still covered with several inches of snow but today (Friday) it's nearly gone. A couple warm days and temperatures remaining consistently above freezing, as well as occasional rainfall this week has worked quite nicely toward helping with it's disappearance. Also, with the angle of the sun becoming more vertical each day, the radiant energy is now better absorbed by the snow and ground (warming and thawing it), compared to throughout the winter months when the sun is lower on the horizon and the energy is more easily refracted or bounced off, lessening it's warming effects.
    Anxious to have a look at #11 (to see if our January ice removal efforts paid off) on Monday we chopped a hole in the ice, set up a water pump with a 2"hose, and "flood melted" the 3-4" snow layer. 
    Throughout the rest of the week Mother Nature took care of the remaining melting process on all other parts of the course!

    With all the melting in progress and the added moisture from rainfall, it's quite understandable that ground conditions are extremely soft. There are in fact many places throughout the course where the soil is still frozen at lower depths. The surface has thawed throughout, but the moisture is being held in the top few inches due to the frozen layer beneath. Continued above freezing temperatures, sunshine, and even rainfall will all aid soil thawing and the eventual drainage that will follow.
    Ice still present on portions of #3 fairway

    Right now it is very important that we avoid any traffic (vehicular, or pedestrian) until this drainage occurs. Compaction, the compressing of soil structure and collapsing of vital pore spaces (which are essential for proper aeration, water holding capacity, and for drainage of excess water) will occur very easily under these saturated conditions. Also, with the soil easily shifted with every footprint and/or vehicle tire pass, turf roots (which are now beginning their most active growth phase) are easily sheared or torn and greatly damaged.

    At this time our grounds staff are refraining from any equipment or vehicle travel, on any turf surface on the property, and even limiting foot traffic as much as possible. I know it is very tempting to walk around the course or grab a club and hit a few balls around, but please give it a little more time to completely thaw and allow excess moisture to drain. It will prevent damage and give the turf a better chance to get a good start to the new season. I'm sure it will be very soon that we'll be able to let course travel resume.
    Your patience, understanding, and cooperation is very much appreciated!
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