Greens update

     Greens have struggled since July 1.  High heat, humidity and Nematodes have some of our greens hurting to say the least.  I have been applying nematicides to our greens to control nematodes the past 3 months.  I am killing some nematodes but not all especially Lance.  There is no nematicide on the market today that can effectively kill Lance nematode.  By killing the competition the Lance nematode have exploded in numbers.  I have tested #5, #6 and #9 greens and all 3 have come back positive for Lance nematode over the threshold.  No other nematode species was hardly found.  This is very disturbing.   After talking with Dr. Crow from University of  Florida yesterday all options for Lance nematode control are poor.  What our greens need is cooler temperatures so they can outgrow this pest.  At this time greens 1, 4, 5, 6, 9, 11, 12, 14 are hurting.  All of these greens have tested positive with Lance nematode this season and in past years. This is a problem we will be dealing with until a new nematicide comes out that controls Lance.

     So where do we go from here.  As you probably know we have raised the mowing height.  Our normal mowing height is .125 or 1/8''.  We have raised it to .140 or 9/64''.  That is 1/64'' higher.  Our 4 worst  greens 10 ,11, 12, 14 we are walk mowing at .180 that is just under 3/16''.  We will continue this until we get a significant break in the weather and we get some recovery.  #11 green is the most impacted green.  Nematodes are not the only problem with this green.  Sunlight is a big factor.  This green is not clear of shade until about 9:30 a.m. The trees that impact this green the most are on our neighbors property.  I have 2 trees on our side of the fence I will be removing this fall or winter  they impact the front of the green which is the weakest area.  Morning sunlight is very important to good healthy bentgrass greens.  We will also be clearing out all of the underbrush all the way back to #12 black tee to help with add air flow.  In the next 2 weeks we will be overseeding the greens with a newer variety of bentgrass.  The newer bentgrasses are not tolerant of nematodes but they are more drought and disease tolerant.  Nematodes are feeding on the root system making them shorter and more prone to wilt. The newer bentgrass will give us more time before wilt sets in.   I have been overseeding greens the past 4 years.  We are slowly converting our greens over to newer bentgrasses.

     This is very hard.  Losing grass is never fun.  I have worked on 3 other golf courses and never had to deal with nematodes at any of them.  What makes it  so bad is you are dealing with a nematode you can not kill.  By trying to kill it I have made it worse.  I ask to please be patience.  Cooler temps are coming and we will get through this.

#11 green shaded at 8:00am.

Up close look at Nematode damage #9 green.

  

     

Update

     It has been few weeks since my last post.  We have been busy.  We installed drainage on 14 and 17 greens.  Now if you hit your ball long on these two holes you will be able to find your ball.  It should not plug.  We also fixed a drain below 14 green.  Roots clogged up  the drain and it was running down into 13 fairway.  #13 forward tee has been sodded with Bluegrass.  This tee stays too wet and does not get enough sunlight to grow Zoysia grass.  It was a little late to be sodding cool season grass but it should be ok.  Getting it open for play will take a little longer than if it was sodded in the spring or fall.  I hope we can have it open by next week.  We were able to sod the green surround on #10.  We ordered some Zoysia grass and fixed some areas in fairways that was thinning or dead.  We fixed aras on 15, 17 and 18 fairways.  While we had the Track hoe we went down to 12 rough and dug out our catch basin that were full of silt.  Below are a few pictures of some of the work we completed.  These projects took 3 long days to complete.  My staff did an outstanding job.

 Cutting in trench #14

 Trench finished #14

Installing pipe and pea gravel

 Capping pea gravel  with sand

Sodding Fescue on top.

Emerald Ash Borer

     We have been busy treating and removing Ash trees throughout the golf course.  Emerald Ash Borer has done considerable damage to all Ash species. It has been in Missouri for about 4-5 years now.  It is widespread throughout the state.  We are treating our healthy trees with a insecticide injected directly into the tree. That gives our trees  3 years control.   Any Ash tree with 40% or more of canopy loss is being removed.  We have removed 11 trees so far and we have at least 6 more to take out.

This is the adult Emerald Ash Borer.  They bore into the Ash tree and lay eggs.  The larvae hatch and feed just under the bark killing the tree.

 Notice this tree hardly has any leaves.  It was removed

  

Staff cleaning up.

Injecting insecticide directly into Ash Tree.  It is a tree IV.  This will give 3 years control of Emerald Ash Borer. 

COVID-19

     This has been a year to remember.  I hope everyone is doing ok.  My staff has been working very hard to get the golf course ready for the season.  With the State of Missouri stay at home order my seasonal staff is still at home.  I have 5 men that are ready  to go when the order is lifted. I have also been staggering my full time employees start times so everyone is not in the shop at the same time.   It has been very challenging to maintain this property with 6 people.  It just does not look right out on the course with no flags and pins in the greens.  Cups upside down who would of ever believed this.

      We suspended all projects that would put my employees closer than 6 feet.  We have been basically maintaining and mowing the golf course.  We had some great weather to get some of our projects checked off our list the past month.  Drainage on 14 green and 17 green are too big ones.  Trimming limbs throughout the golf course and removing a number of dead and damaged trees is next.  We have been hammered with lots of rain.  We get the stay at home order and it turns dry go figure.  We have a big list of projects that seems to get bigger every year.

      Hopefully we are starting to turn the corner and we can  get back closer to normal.  Please stay safe. It won't be long and we can all enjoy golf the way it is supposed to be played.

Spring Aerification

We just finished our Spring aerification.  We deep drilled 5/8'' holes 10'' deep on 5''x 5'' centers.  after that we came behind with our Toro Procore 648 and punch 3/8'' holes 3'' deep on 1.5''x 1.5'' centers.  Here is a little trivia for you.  We have a total of 2 acres of greens.  We drilled a total of 792,000 holes with the deep drill machines.  We aerified a total of 5,632,000 holes with our Procore.  A grand total of 6,424,000 aerifying holes in our greens.
     Aerification is used for gas exchange in the root zone.  O2 needs to get down to the root zone and CO2 needs to get out of the root zone.  The aerification holes gives the gases a channel to get in and escape.  We also aerify to eliminate thatch.  Thatch can cause multiple problems.  Soft spongy greens to increase disease and insect pressure.  Aerification is a very important cultural practice to have nice playing greens.
     You will notice the holes are much smaller than in past years.  We used smaller tines but punched twice as many holes.  Below are a few pictures of the process.  My staff did an outstanding job.  We aerified all 19 greens plus 9 white tee in one day.

We verticut in 2 different direction before we aerified

Deep drill machine

 Look at the holes.  You can see the bigger deep drill hole below the keys.

 We used 35 tons of sand.

Dragging the sand into holes

Finished

10 Bridge completed

     It took about 1 month but 10 bridge is new and improved.  We added some much need support under the decking of the bridge.  You will notice when you drive across no more clatter.  It took a little longer than we thought.  The weather did not help out.  My staff did an outstanding job.

#10 Bridge

     We have been busy working on #10 bridge.  It has been too wet to get any work done on the golf course so we are fixing up the bridge.  This has been on our to do list since last summer.  We are replacing the rails, decking and beefing up some of the sub flooring.  I hope we will take out a lot of the clattering when you drive over the bridge.  We are also going to stain the entire bridge Forest green.  This will give it a much longer life and it will look much better.  We have another week of work before we get the bridge back open.  Sorry for any inconvenience.  Below are a few pictures of our progress.

 tearing down the old railing and flooring

 Staining our post

 Post going up

Railing finished.