Tee aerifaction

     We have been busy trying to get our tee's aerified.  We actually started last week but had a break down and had to stop for 3 days until we could get the parts to fix our aerifier.  We have 6 holes left to complete.  We will finish them on Monday.  We use a 1/2 inch tine on 2.5 inch centers.  This pulls up quite a bit of material to be removed.  I would like to thank my staff for there hard work getting this important cultural practice completed.  It takes 8 people to aerify and clean up the tees.

 Nick aerifying tee.

 

 Cleaning off tee

Finished

Bermuda grass eradication update

     These are the holes we are spraying to kill bermuda grass this season. Fairways, 7, 8, 18,  Tees 1- 4,  Green surrounds and collars 3, 7, 8.  We might expand this to other areas we will let you know if any extra areas are treated.   Remember this will kill only the bermuda grass our zoysia and fescue will not be killed.  The zoysia, bentgrass and fescue will turn slightly yellow but will be ok.  We need 3 treatments this year and 3 more treatments next year.  At the moment you can see a little injury to the Bermuda grass on 7, 8, and 18 fairways.  So far only # 1 tees have been sprayed. The remaining tees will be sprayed this week.  We will be spraying Green surrounds and collars in late August early September.

 

Notice the brown is bermuda.  Foreground has not been sprayed.  You can see some discoloring of the zoysia.  Zoysia will grow out of the herbicide damage.

Divot pattern

  The right and wrong way to practice on our Driving Range tee.  Please use the linear method.  If you see someone not using the linear method please educate them on the proper way to take a divot off our practice tee. 

WRONG DIVOT PATTERN 

THE RIGHT WAY BEAUTIFUL PATTERN

 This picture was taken on 6/26/17

 Same spot 7/19/17.  3 weeks almost completely healed

Golf Course Update

     We had a very busy week.  On Monday all greens were Hydrojected.  Hydrojecting is aerification using high pressure water to create a hole.  This method is very easy on the greens.  It makes a small hole on 3 inch by 3 inch centers.  Aerification is very important for gas exchange during hot wet weather.  Remember our greens need oxygen and they get it through the roots system.

    Also on Monday we had 3 tee's laser leveled by Schaefer-Meyer.  We did # 4 Red/Gold, # 7 Black and # 10 Red/Gold.  On Tuesday we received 560 yards of Zoysia and sodded the new level tee's.  That was one hot day to be laying sod.  We did have a little bit of Zoysia left over and we cut out some Bermuda grass on the approaches on holes 4, 5, and 9.

 Schaefer-Meyer tilling up # 4 tee

 



 Laser leveling.  We enlarged this tee quite a bit

 Laying sod

Finished

    

Nematodes

    
     The Lance Nematode we had last season are back.  This is very frustrating to say the least.  I have tested 5 greens, # 4, # 5, # 9, # 15, and # 18.  The only green that did not have Lance nematode over the threshold was # 18.  In fact it hardly has any turf feeding nematodes at all.  We have treated all greens.  10 greens were treated with some older reliable chemistry and 9 greens were treated with a brand new Nematicide. 
     Lance Nematodes are the hardest species of turf feeding nematodes to control.  They live in the soil and inside of the plant roots.  This is why they are so hard to control.  If they are in the roots the only way to kill them is with a systemic Nematicide.  There is only one systemic Nematicide on the market today and the testing has been mixed.  Dr. Crow from the University of Florida has had some positive trails with it but has also had little control or no control. Dr. Miller from University of Missouri is doing some trials this year on the 3 Nematicides available.  Hopefully he has some good results.
     With the hot weather on its way next week.  We are in a fight to keep our greens in good shape.  We are alternating mowing and rolling greens.  We are also raising the height of cut on greens from .125 to .135. We will be spraying extra soil conditioner on our greens to help our root system recover from the damage the Nematodes have done.  I plan on testing a few more greens to see where Nematode levels are at.  Not all greens will have Lance nematode over the threshold but we have no way of telling without testing them.
     This is the 3rd year we have had problems with Nematodes.  Next season I plan on going on a nematode control program.  This will be an expensive program.  We will be using biological products along with Nematicides to protect our greens.  There has been some good results using the Biological products to protect the roots of the turfgrass plant.  The days of applying a product to kill nematodes is gone.   The new Nematicides have to be applied before you have problems and you need a minimum of 3 applications.  We will do our best to give you the best greens to play on.  Greens will be a bit slower as we try to get through the dog days of summer.

Nematode feeding on root.

Bermuda grass eradication

     With most old golf course multiple turf species is common place.  Franklin County Country Club was established in 1924.  Through the years before Irrigation systems many different species of turf grass were used on the golf course.  One species that was used was Bermuda grass.  Bermuda grass is a warm season turf that can go for long periods of time without water.  Back in the day if you had Bermuda grass in your fairways you had some turf to hit off of in the summer.  The problem with Bermuda grass is it is only good for about 3 months out of the year.  When it goes dormant in the winter it dies back to the ground.  That does not give you the best lie for playing golf in winter and spring.  When it greens up in the spring it is very slow to do so. 
     Back in the early to mid 90's the club spent a lot of money to sod our fairways to Meyer Zoysia grass.  Over the years the Bermuda grass has continued to contaminate the Zoysia Fairways.  Bermuda grass is  more aggressive than the Zoysia.  Zoysia grass is a much better turfgrass.  It is finer textured and the ball stands up on it.  In the winter the leaves turn brown but they do not die back to the ground.  You still have a nice lie in the winter.  Over the last 20 years we have lost some of our Zoysia to the Bermuda.  If you look close enough in the Fairways you can see the difference in color and texture.  You will even see some of the long stolens in the fairways.
     The fairways are not the only place we have Bermuda contamination.  Our tee's, some of our collars and some of our green surrounds are also contaminated.  There are some herbicides on the market that will selectively kill the Bermuda and not hurt the Zoysia and cool season turf.  We will be using some of these products on a few holes.  It will take 3 applications 1 month apart to kill the Bermuda grass.  We will do 2 or 3 fairways,  about 1 acre of tee's and 2 different green surrounds and collars. You will notice the Bermuda will turn brown or white depending which herbicides are used.  When we are finished in September we may need to buy some Zoysia sod to sod big voided areas.  In areas that are not as big the Zoysia will fill back in on it own.  So the next 3 month if you see something a little off to some of our fairways, tee, collars and green surrounds we are trying to eradicate the Bermuda grass.  This is the first phase.  The next few years we will expand on this program and do all of our fairways, tee's and green surrounds and collar that have contamination.

Top of picture is Zoysia.  Bottom part has Bermuda contamination

Here is Bermuda grass stolens

Happy July 4th

I would like to take this time to wish our membership a Happy July 4th.  Here is some of the handy work Kaley and Connie did for the Clubhouse.

Yellow/Brown tee's

    You might be wondering what is up with the yellow/brown tee's.  We are going to laser level at least 6 tee's this summer.  We are starting with 4 red/gold, 7 blue/black, and 10 red/gold.  We have so much Bermuda grass contamination that we are spraying the tee's to kill any Bermuda that is living in them.  We will then strip all sod and Schaefer-Meyer will come out and level tee.  We will go back with new Zoysia grass.  If the herbicide does its job the Bermuda will not contaminate the new tee.
#4 tee will be enlarged about 8 or 10 feet towards the cart path.  # 7 blue/black and # 10 red/gold will be leveled and just slightly enlarged.  The next set of tee's to be leveled are 7 white 14 black and 15 white.  If we have time we will do 1 white, 7 gold/red and 10 white.  We will start with the first 3 tee's on Monday July 10th. 

 

                                        Here is shot of 4 gold/Red tee.  turning yellow and brown.