It's hard to believe we are making our final fairway fungicide/fertilizer spray this morning. While dollar spot (fungus) is not an issue during cold weather, it can show up during our mild fall days. If we don't keep on a preventative schedule through October and into the beginning of November, it will explode. If it takes hold now, it won't heal until spring. The application is well justified in my opinion.
As I mentioned previously, we are aerifying a few areas of fairways today (#3,#5, #6, #12). Hillsides and high traffic areas are the focus; areas that would benefit from a tighter hole spacing (more disruption) or areas that are difficult to get with a tractor. This walk behind machine allows to create holes on 2" centers. The tractor mounted aerifiers we own do not create a tight hole spacing. Plus, the quality of the hole is not near as good. Once these plugs dry this afternoon, we will drag the plugs with a chain link drag mat, blow the debris to the center of the fairway and manually pick it up. The tighter spacing means more holes and thus, more opportunity to work sand into the root zone. This will even lead to fewer earthworms on fairways like #3.
These 4 holes will be 'cart path only' today. We can't afford to have carts driving through the plugs because it will create a mess.
There is a 70% chance of rain tomorrow. I am waiting on rain to pull the trigger on fertilizing greens with this 17-0-17 fertilizer. I hate the thought of irrigating greens this time of year because they are perfect. If it rains, we might as well get some benefit from it and allow it to help us by watering in fertilizer. Next week, the height of cut (HOC) of greens will go up to .135" from the current .125". We will also back off of daily double cutting. The primary reason is the lack of sun the greens are getting. We always see a fair amount of thinning this time of year because of that. In fact, in extreme cases like #16, we are withholding mowers for a period of 3 days to minimize traffic and stress. The more lead tissue the turf has, the more efficiently it can make its own feed through photosynthesis. While raising the HOC might slow the greens down a little, our focus this time of year is on next year. We certainly want healthy greens going into winter because that means healthy greens in spring and into next summer.
As I have always said, sunlight is crucial to any plant, especially grass. If turfgrass doesn't receive at least 5-6 hours of full sun a day, it can't photosynthesize (make food). This means its growth is stunted, and it certainly can't recover from stress or tolerate all the things we as Superintendents do to it to create good playing surfaces. Let me now put that into perspective: #16 receives 1-2 hours of sun this time of year. This is why we are backing off mowing and other practices. It can't tolerate the abuse and would eventually thin to the point where no grass is left. As trees get larger and denser, the challenge only gets worse!
