Should I Dare Say It...I hate sod!

Typically I try not to write a lot of opinions on this blog and stick to facts about what we are positively accomplishing on the golf course.  But I really can't help this one. I hate sodding on the golf course and I will try to avoid it when at all possible.  There I said it!  Sod is a quick fix in most instances and it has its place, but when it comes to greens or fairways the long-term success is difficult and sod needs to be managed for many years until it matures into the site.

Typically sod used on our greens either is harvested from a practice green or comes from our sod nursery.  Sod, no matter where it comes from, from my experience, is fickle for the first 1-2 years.  The roots tend to be shallow, extra watering is constantly required and all it takes is one day of heat stress and the sod can be lost.  Sod requires extra fertility as well as topdressing and aeration.  Hence it takes a couple of years until it establishes properly and blends into playing surface. 

Sod laid this spring on the 1st green.  Plugging of the dead spots will be required.

Sod laid this spring on the 1st green, took a hit this past week during the week of severe heat.  All it took was a few hours of heat and a lack of water and turf loss happened quickly.  Additionally sod that was laid last year on some fairway and approach areas has been struggling in the heat, despite additional aeration, fertilizer and fungicide treatments.  Even into the second year, with decent roots, Fickle! 

Sod laid in the spring of 2010. Struggling due to shallow roots, mower traffic and cart traffic.

August Newsletter Article "The Eagle Eye"

Since I just completed my August newsletter article for The Minikahda Columns, I thought I might as well share it on the blog.

Typical Minnesota Weather?                      

It seems every season in Minnesota we deal with extremes; extreme cold, extreme heat and this past month extreme dew points.  July’s weather was one for the records and thankfully the course made it through virtually unscathed.  Proper preparation leading up to the heat, backing off of unnecessary cultural practices such as mowing and rolling of greens and a careful watch of the plants was critical to the turf survival during that stretch of weather.  Proper application of plant protectants was also critical as dew points and temperatures reached record highs.  The weather provided ideal conditions for pathogens such as brown patch and pythium blight.  A perfect storm for disease pressure, fortunately our fine turf areas did not suffer loss from any of these diseases.

The Art Water Management

When to water? What areas to water? Do we water lightly or deeply? What will tomorrow’s weather bring? What does the rest of the weeks weather look like? What events are happening this week? Should we hold off water and wait? Do we syringe greens or do they need a little more to make it through the day? As you can see from these questions there’s little science involved when it comes to water management decisions and a lot more art.  Every day we ask ourselves these questions. I consult with our experienced staff and we make a daily decision before we head home.  Most of the time I think we get it right but sometimes we guess wrong (usually because I tend to lean conservatively with water giving the benefit to the plant that it can survive another day before we need to water it). 

The thing about water, once it’s down, it’s down. We can’t take the application back.  Our goal is not only to provide firm playing conditions, but we also want to maintain healthy turf with deep roots.  From a turf managers, prospective we strive to make deep infrequent irrigation cycles that will promote deep roots on our greens, tees, fairways and rough. Nightly watering may be necessary based on daily weather conditions, but I also feel it conditions the plant to require that type of watering.  By stretching the water cycles we can condition the plants to survive extended periods without nightly watering, mimicking conditions found in nature.  Do we need to water tonight?  That’s should be the ultimate daily question for all Greenkeepers.

Imprelis Herbicide by Dupont          

If you’ve been reading the papers (Star Tribune, July 23^rd, A Surprise Toll on Trees) you’ve probably seen some articles regarding the damage the new herbicide Imprelis has had on coniferous trees on golf courses and homeowners lawns.  We have not used this herbicide on the golf course and there is no concern for tree loss on the golf course do to use of this product. 

Fall Construction Projects

By now you know about the Driving range and tennis projects, we also have a few small projects on the golf course that have been approved for completion.  The left greenside pot bunker on #2 will be expanded to entire left of the green.  The right fairway bunker on #17 will be converted to a double stacked bunker (similar to the fairway bunkers on #5) and a new 600 yard tee will be added to the 13^th hole.  These minor projects are slated to begin this fall.  Hartman Companies will provide the rough shaping and the finish work will be completed in house by our staff.  Looks like we’re going to have a busy fall.

Taking it Easy

The next couple days will test our experience as turf managers.  Day temperatures in the high 90's and dew points in the 70's equaling heat indexes around 105-115, not ideal conditions for cool season turfgrass.  Plant protectants have been applied to the fine turf areas to protect the plants from diseases such as Brown Patch and Pythium blight. Reducing stress on the turf is a top concern so we will be reducing our mowing and rolling on greens, alternating mow and roll days and will be stretching our fairway mowing from 3 days a week to 2 days a week.  Mowing is one of the worst activities we can do to the plants during long periods of heat stress.  If there is a cultural practice we can control it's mowing, so we will reduce it as much as we feel we can and still provide the members with quality playing conditions.

Venting of greens surfaces will again take place next Monday and we will be monitoring and scouting greens, tees and fairways a little more closely during this brutal stretch of weather.  The good thing about living in Minnesota is, this will eventually end and a cool front will blow this out of here.  Until then we will be monitoring the turf and reducing cultural practices to the bare minimum. 

Invitational Week

This week is the club's Invitational Golf Event. As far as events at the club go, this is one of our Major's. Member/Member in August being the other Major. The weather over the past few weeks has produced a great deal of rain, high dew points as well as high temperatures. Based on the past weather as well as the forecast for upcoming days, heat index's reaching into the low 100's, even with this weeks "Major" on the schedule, we felt today was an ideal time to vent (aerate) the greens.

Earlier in the week when we walked on greens we could smell that the greens needed to be vented. We could smell the anaerobic activity taking place in the soils and the best cure for allowing gas exchange is to vent the greens. Roots need oxygen to survive and when oxygen is depleted reduction in root depth is greatly compromised. With as much poa annua as we have on greens, maintaining proper root depths throughout the summer months is critical to poa's survival and the quality and condition of greens.

Needle tine aeration "Venting"

Today's aeration began at 5am and the guys were finished with 19 greens by 11am. As you can see in the photos the needle tines that we use cause little disturbance to the surface and when followed by the rollers there is little to no evidence that greens were even aerated. Pretty good work to have completed 2 days before our Invitational and 3 days before and other 1-3" predicted rain event as well as 4-5 days in the mid to high 90's

The green following a roll.

Last Friday's Storm

Last Friday night straight line winds tore through the north end of the golf course. Damage was contained to holes 1, 15, 17 and 18 as well as to the driveway. Four trees were lost on the golf course, a Linden right of the dogleg bunker on 15, 2 maples on the left of 17, a Larch on the right side of 17, a large spruce from the driveway entrance as well as one of the your Princeton elm trees from in front of the club house. We also lost numerous trees along the pool slope.

Our staff was able to clean the bulk of debris on Saturday morning and made quick work of the damage. On Wednesday, Tim's Tree Service was able to grind the stumps, remove the stock pile of trees as well as remove some hangers in a few elm trees as a result of the storm. Let's hope this is all the summer storm damage we will see for the rest of the season.

And if you're wondering will these trees will be replaced? At this time there are no plans to replace the trees that were destroyed on the golf course. The only tree that is currently planned for replacement is the Princeton Elm. Replacement will not happen until the fall when it's safer for the new tree to be transported and planted.

Creeping Bentgrass vs Poa annua

Manage for creeping bentgrass or manage for poa annua? This is the ultimate questions that Superintendents ask themselves and is an industry wide topic. A topic that will probably never be resolved. Many say if you have poa annua manage it. Well we've had poa dominant fairways before and let me tell you they're really not that fun to manage. Now that we've been managing for creeping bentgrass, to me the answer is quite clear.

A perfect is example is on our fairways. I probe fairways quite frequently and one reason is I love looking at our bentgrass roots. They are DEEP! I on average I find our roots to be 12-18" deep. Deep roots equal less water, less fertilizer and all round healthier plants. Also by watering deep and infrequently we can provide firm playing conditions as we are able to stretch the length between water cycles. We also have less thatch on the fairways. We are able provide conditions that are adventitious for deep roots which also equals less fertility and that allows us to stretch our fertility applications and as a result have less thatch on the fairways as the roots are going deep and are not limited to the top 4 inches.

Our poa roots, on the other hand are shallow. Shallow rooted plants need to be babied and require a great deal more TLC. As you can see in this photo, poa annua roots are only 4" deep compared to the 12" roots of the creeping bentgrass. Moisture levels at 12" soil depths are very good. Right where the creeping bentgrass roots extend. Heading into the heat of the summer we can all sleep a lot better knowing if the roots are deep and healthy so will be the playing surfaces.