Verticutting Greens

     We are verticutting our greens today.  Verticutting is basically mechanically removing turf.  We have units that fit on our greens mower that have knives that look like a circular saw blade. They are spaced 1/2 inch apart. We set them to go into the turf at a set depth.  We can go from 0 to 1/8 inch down.  This removes excess thatch and cuts horizontal leaves off the bentgrass.  Bentgrass likes to grow horizontally and is a very big thatch producer.  Too much thatch is not good.  We want our grass to grow upright. Every place we cut the leaves off the bentgrass sends up a new leaf that grows vertical.  After we verticut you will notice the ball will roll true and straight.  This is labor intensive job.  3 people to do one job.  We will do it again just before we aerate greens.

 

Tim Verticutting  greens

Thatch  in bucket

Close up of green after verticut.  Notice lines

 



We remove a load of clippings and sand per green 

Video of verticutting

Aerification update

     Green aerification will take place next Monday and Tuesday.  Monday we will aerate  1-9 and the Putting green.  These holes will be closed.  The back nine will be open for play.  On Tuesday we will aerate the back nine holes 10-18 and 9 white tee.  Back nine holes will be closed and the front will be open.  Greens will heal in 10 to 14 day.  Sorry for any inconvenience. 

Green Aerification Time

It is that time of year we have to aerify our greens.  We are scheduled to aerate on Monday 3/30/15 and Tuesday 3/31/15.  I know this is not a well received cultural practice but it is one that is vital to having good greens.  Please be patient in about 10 to 14 days it will be a faint memory.

Happy Spring

Spring is coming!!!

 

 

This is what our landscape beds look like now. 

 

This is what they will look like soon.

Ball Marks

     One of the draw backs about playing golf in the winter is the damage done to greens by balls hitting the greens.  During the winter the Bentgrass greens are not growing and can easily be damaged by a  ball hit to the greens.  It is most severe when the greens are frozen.  When the ball strikes the green it will kill the turf on that spot.  Par 3 are the most troublesome because most shots  fly directly to the green, longer holes balls can run up to green. We can have hundreds of spot throughout a green.  The good news is the ball marks will fill in as it warms up this spring.  Below are some pictures of # 14 green showing the damage. 

The white spots are the damaged areas.

 

Notice the old cup above the knife.

My Leatherman is 4 inches long

Brushing Greens

     We are in spring mode now.  We have mowed our greens twice in the last week.  Greens are starting to grow after a long winter.  We are using the brush attachment on our walk mower to help cut any long grass blades off.  Our Greens were seeded with  Penncross Creeping Bentgrass.  This is an aggressive spreading bentgrass variety.  One of the problems is it like to grow sideways and after regular mowing we do not always cut off all the grass blades.  The brush stands the grass up so the mower can do its job.  This makes for much better putting on our greens.  We only have 1 walk mower set up this way.  Nick will mow all 19 greens and it will take him 6 to 7 hours.  He will walk about 9 miles by the time he is done. That will keep a guy thin. 

Nick mowing # 14 green.

Nice stripping with the brush.