Opening, Trees, and Little Red Dots

Opening day has finally arrived.  The grass is just starting to grow, but thanks to dry conditions the course is firm enough to handle play.  Unfortunately, with temperatures in the 20's and 30's for the next few nights, play will likely be limited to afternoons.  You will notice there is still some storm damage we are working hard to clean up, but hopefully we can pick at it over the next few weeks and get the course looking great again. 

Many people have asked about the trees that were damaged by the President's Day storm.  Our plan right now is to be patient.  We will start by cleaning up the downed limbs, and soon we will rent a bucket lift so we can prune the stubs that remain up in the trees along with any 'widowmakers' that hang above.

Finally, a word about the red paint dots on the greens and fairways.  Every spring, I dot the edges of the greens and some fairways and tees with red paint, and I always get a lot of questions like: "Are you shrinking the greens?" or "Why are you making the fairways bigger?".  Well, the answer is that as we transition from winter to spring, the actual edge of the bentgrass on the greens and fairways is easily distinguished from the other species of grasses present.  Therefore, I am only putting the mowed edges back where they belong.  We do this for aesthetics, to maintain the proper contours of the fairway design, and to make sure the right species of grass are mowed at the right height (in the case of the fairways and step cut). Below are some photos:

You can see the dark turf between the red lines and the step cut.  The step cut is seeded with ryegrass, which is darker, and had been accidentally mowed by a fairway mower at some point.  We are trying to get the ryegrass back to its proper height.

Same situation here on a green.  The white line where the collar meets the green has been 'scalped' by a mower.  The red dot indicate where the edge of the green should be.

Here's the edge of the putting green.  See where the bluegrass has been mowed down by a collar mower?  This is the best time of year to grow that out and get the proper shape and turf in place.

Another sharp turn on the hill of 10 fairway.  An easy mistake to make.

Finally finished with our little irrigation repair.

If you followed earlier posts, we had our 10" iron gate valve on #9 to repair.  Finally, with the snow gone, the creek back in its banks, we were able to finish it up.  Here's a few shots from that project.

The item in Gary's hand is about a 3/4 inch sheet of ice that covered the hole.  Always fun to work with water when it's 30 degrees.

10" pipe is hard to work with, and even harder to cut straight.

Chris, from Liebold Irrigation was brought in to help ensure the seals and fittings were all properly installed and functioning. 

Unfortunately, there was an old concrete thrust block that had to be busted out before we could reinstall the valve.

Checking the fit.

A couple of tweaks and ready to install.

Chris, from the irrigation company, had a long, dirty day, and we all learned some new 4-letter words.

The finished valve.  Just a little dirt and concrete to properly stabilize everything so we hopefully never have to dig this thing up again.

First cuts, irrigation work, opening....later.

Shaking off winter is seeming easier said than done.  We are well into the latter half of March, and the weather continues to be cold and wet, and the long range forecast is bleak.  Despite this, we have been busy nonetheless getting ready for the spring.  Just last week, we successfully extracted a 10" irrigation valve that sprung a major leak last fall.  The pros will be out next week to make sure we install it correctly.  With the 60 degree temps and only a little rain overnight, we were able to get out and do some mowing.  Greens were rolled and mowed, and the fairways that weren't too wet were also cut for the first time.  We got quite a bit of winter fuzz knocked off, but upcoming temperatures in the 20's and 30's do not bode well for spring growth.  With the weekend looking like highs in the low to mid-30's, an early weekend opening does not look likely.  With any luck, I still have my eyes on Friday, April 1st as a good opening date.  Mother Nature will ultimately decide.   

Everyone likes to know what the criteria for opening are.  First off, the course must be relatively dry and able to deal with cart and foot traffic.  The grass has spent the winter using up its root structure as carbohydrate to survive dormancy, so there isn't great stability under the surface.  We must be dry, or a couple of busy HMGC weekends could cause quite a lot of damage.  Also, I like to see some growth and a vigorous, healthy plant to withstand the busy golf schedule.  The last couple of years, we have had warm March temperatures that have gotten the ball rolling a little earlier than usual.  Often I look at soil temperature and 'growing degree days' to guess at when the grass will be ready to accept play and offer good conditions.  Based on previous years, we are about 10-days to 2 weeks behind.  Here's hoping for a heat wave! 

Below are a couple of pictures from the irrigation work.  It was a big mess, but at least the sun was shining.



The fun part - digging a big, muddy hole to expose the 10" valve and pipe.

Rebar and concrete hold the valve still, so we needed a torch to get things freed up.

When in doubt, a chainsaw will cut just about anything.

The valve probably weighs about 200 lbs, so the skid-steer loader was the best way to get it out.









A little swing tip to start the golf season

With the season approaching, I thought I would take a little time to share some helpful golf tips to start out the year.  I'm sure you will find this as helpful as I did.

Some late winter photos.

We have finally melted and rained our way out from the late winter snow and ice.....again.  I took a stroll around the course yesterday with camera in hand.  Overall, I was pleasantly supprised by how well the course had drained and withstood the late winter blast. 

Unfortunately, April 1st is looking to be a more likely opening date than the March openings of the last two seasons.  There is limited if any growth and green up at this point, with some localized exceptions.  The greens and fairways are still quite soft, and with the coming rains, will be some time before we can put vehicle traffic on the course.



Sandy bunker banks green-up slowly.

Above, you can see how the rough around the greens isn't really greening up too much just yet.  To the left you can see how the bunker faces are slower to green up.  This is mostly due to the buildup of sand over the years and years of steady play.  Things are just starting to wake up, but the ground is still quite soft, and likely to become softer if the predicted rains hit us.  We are chomping at the bit to get out, as we still have yet to be able to access the tree mess from the ice storm. 


There are some areas, mostly low-lying wetter areas that are starting to green up.  #18 fairway, the bottom of #1 fairway, and #3 fairway are showing preliminary signs of life.  Unfortunately, with the wetness, they also acquired a smidgeon of late-season snow mold.  You may see it when we open, but if temperatures rise, we should grow through it in no time later this spring.


Our friend Mr. Snow Mold.

 With the recent high-water events, we did finally see a little damage.  Not much to worry about, but the creek did get a little over #2 tee bank once again.  It wouldn't feel like a normal spring if we didn't have some sort of repair to this area!  As you can see, the sod we placed last year post-flood just wasn't quite rooted well enough to withstand the minor flooding.  There was a little sediment dropped to the left of the path and behind #1 green.


Sediment from the flooding behind #1 green.



Sod damage by # 2 tee.





Despite this mess, we have dealt with far worse conditions in the spring.  Let's hope that we can avoid any massive spring rains, and have a normal, on-time opening in early April.  I know you all are as anxious to get out there as we are.



TurfMutt.com. Great info for weekend warriors and educators.

I stumbled on this link to TurfMutt.com.  A curious little educational blog and website dedicated to maintaining your yard and educating kids.  It amazes me how little people actually know about how to take care of a lawn.  With just a little motivation and Google, it's great to see more content online to help the back yard battler do it better and more environmentally considerate. 

One of my favorite parts of my job is answering questions from members about their lawn.  It gives me an opportunity to engage them while also provide a little insight.  I am always happy to offer a passing tip or occasionally visit a home to give a few tips.  Click on the link below if you are proud of the fact that your lawn looks bettter than your neighbor.  It's a perfect time to get ready for springtime!

http://www.turfmutt.com/

Golf in the (Middle) Kingdom

I frequently enjoy the blog of Pat Jones. This month, among other topics, he showed some pictures and insight from the Chinese golf world, which is growing rapidly.

Jonesy's World: Golf in the (Middle) Kingdom: "Amazing things are being done in China right now. Here's a new course designed by Curley & Schmidt. Doesn't even seem real. My colleague..."

Some great articles about opening dates and spring aeration

As the snow is slowly disappearing, everyone's thoughts will turn to golf. "When are we going to open" and "when are we aerating" will be the two biggest questions. The link below to the USGA Green Section has some great articles on why we don't fling the doors open until conditions are just right, and why we aerify in the spring.

We usually open the golf course around April 1st. This is completely dependent on soil temperatures, growth of the greens, and whether or not I think they can handle the high traffic we put on them here at HMGC. As you can see in the articles linked below, early opening can cause problems that can make the greens suffer throughout the season. With the amount of play we have here, it's important to open when it's right.

Spring aeration is scheduled for April 11th. Like last fall, things will be a little different from the usual core-aerifying, which should result in a quicker healing and better rolling greens. I will speak to that when we get closer to April.

Below is the link to some good information from the USGA
http://myemail.constantcontact.com/USGA-Green-Section-Record--March-04--2011.html?soid=1103157499740&aid=cJbB7kFuMlk

The Melt-off part 2

What a difference a week makes.  In less than 2 weeks, we have gone from looking almost golf-ready to buried in ice, snow, and limbs, and now we are enjoying the all-too-common flood season.  Warmer temps and a little sun has started melting off the President's Day mess and subsequent snow.  I can hear Johnny Cash singing "How High's the Water Mama".

So far, we have to be getting close to crest, and water levels aren't anywhere near panic level yet.  After the floods of '06 and '08, there's not much to be concerned about now.  With any luck, the water won't get too much higher and we can get out on the course soon.

As of 1pm, water is just creeping around #9 bridge.

#9 drop area

Some sandbags near #9 bridge to protect the exposed irrigation valve we hope to repair before the spring. 

#10 and #11 starting to swell.

The temporary green on #11 froze overnight.  Now it's the consistency of a giant slurpee.

After the severe spring floods from 2 seasons ago, we raised the bank and added rock protection on #2 tee.  Looks like it's working as planned!

Bottom of #2 fairway starting to fill up.