Wednesday Greens Aeration

As promised, all putting greens on the golf course are being aerated today with 1/4" hollow tines on a tight spacing.  The next cultural practice we perform on the greens will be a DryJect aeration on April 8th.  The golf course opens for play on Friday, April 10th. 

Tuesday

There is a lot going on today on the golf course that you'll be interested to see.  First, we are aggressively verticutting the 12th and 14th greens.  As you know, these greens were reconstructed last winter and sodded exactly one year ago.  Last spring and early summer, we ramped up our topdressing program and also aerated these greens a couple times.  Our goal was and still is, to remove the sod layer that comes with sodding a green and then to incorporate as much sand as possible to firm up the top inch of the profile.  This layer, high in organic material, can impede the movement of water through the rootzone and it's my goal to remove as much of it as possible.  Failure to do so, will make these greens play soft and slower than our other greens. 

A Graden verticutter is a machine that removes organic matter by cutting a serious of small "trenches" by way of table-saw blades.  Then, dry sand is deposited behind the verticutter, filling in the small 3 mm trenches.  When finished, this process disrupts about 11% of the green's surface to a depth of one inch.  In short, it is the most effective way to deal with excess organics in the top inch.

Greens are also being treated with a fungicide today to clean up some yellow patch, a foliar fungal disease that's been seen on a handful of collars and putting greens.

We are also back to irrigating, and there is a lot to water.  Drain lines and new sod requires more irrigating now because the root system hasn't fully developed yet.

The putting greens are looking great, but it's clearly evident that Poa annua is the dominate species right now.  It grows at lower temperatures compared to Creeping Bentgrass.  Once our soil temperatures get up above the 65* range, the Bentgrass will kick in and give us a more uniform appearance.  Until then, Poa annua will have that mottled appearence.

More from Monday…

 

Lyn Zalapa did a wonderful job on the expanded patio at the croquet pavilion!  So proud of the fact we have this talent in-house, to be able to accomplish projects like these.  Of course, it's a great benefit to the Club.  We now have to do the same to the other side of the pavilion to allow for more table/chair room.

After another full day of bunker work, we were able to finish all the golf course.  The sand depth has been checked across the floor of the bunkers to be sure we have an even 4" of compacted sand.  In total, 24 tons of sand was added to the bunkers on the golf course.  They were then aggressively raked and to fluff them up after a long winter of rain and snow.

Spring Aeration Schedule

To give you an idea of what our spring aeration plans are, see below.  Keep in mind, the golf course doesn't open for play until Friday, April 10th.

 Spring Aeration Schedule

March 24th:  Graden verticut greens on holes #12 and #14. 

March 25th: quad tine all the greens on the golf course. No sand to be applied before or after aeration. 

April 1^st: Brian will be fertilizing the golf course wall to wall, crabgrass pre-emergent included.

April 7^th: Quad tine the croquet lawns, the 2 front chipping greens at the range and the nursery green.  I would like to topdress all these surfaces a couple times before aerating.  

April 8^th: DryJect all greens on the golf course. 

Monday

It's another beautiful morning for March in Highlands!  Today we are aerating the fairways on holes #1, 6, 9 and 11.  These are the four fairways that extensive drainage was installed this winter.  Once this is complete, we'll clean up the fairways and topdress.  We skipped these 4 fairways this past winter so the drainage contractor wouldn't be dealing with sod falling apart because it looked like Swiss cheese!

Greens are really coming on nicely!  Later today, I will be posting the spring aeration schedule.

7-Day Forecast

 

Drainage on #3 Approach

The drainage project on the golf course is officially finished for the winter!  This means we are now able to complete areas like #11 tees, where all the spoils from the drainage ditches were hauled.  Paving of the cart path on #11 is scheduled for either Wednesday or Thursday of this week  Once that occurs, weather permitting, we'll really begin to prep for sod and have that area finished and open by April 10th.  I'm also happy to report that we had some material left over from the drainage project and were able to include #3 approach into the list of accomplishments this off-season.  Specifically, we drained the area between the 3rd green and the 4th tee boxes.  2026 is going to be a great year!

USGA Green Section Record

 CLICK HERE!

Click above to access the latest edition of the USGA's Green Section Record.

Friday

Golf course labor is pulled in many directions... some projects aren't even on the golf course.  Today, three of our team members, led by Lyn, started on enlarging the croquet pavilion stone patio to allow for more table and chair seating.  The countdown is on for the opening of the golf course on April 10th and I have zero concerns- we will be ready!   

More from Thursday

We've been cleaning up a lot of areas where briars and other weeds are prevalent including this spot on #17.

Our Landscape Tech, John Branson is making some great progress on the new courtyard area at the Clubhouse entrance.  I'm proud of the job he's doing on this project.

 

Today we also started bunker prep.  It is a little early, but we want the bunkers to be raked a few times prior to opening so the sand has time to settle after it's been stirred up aggressively after winter of snow, ice and rain compaction.  Our primary goal is making sure the floor of the bunkers have an even 4" of sand across them.

Thursday

Another load of 18 pallets of sod was delivered this morning, allowing us to sod many of the areas that were disturbed over the winter.  Below, the team is working on #6.

Wednesday

 

Today we started the irrigation system for the season.  I always time the springtime priming of our pumpstation with an annual preventative maintenance service to be sure everything is in working order for the season.

Above, #11 drainage is finished, including the rough between the fairway and the cart path.  This will help getting golf carts to the fairway on days that are wet, but not wet enough for cart path only to be in effect.  

Now that the 11th hole drainage is finished, it's on to #15 approach.  Once this approach is complete, we have a few lines to run on #16 green surround and a few on #17 approach.  We'll have this finished in a week or less.

John is working hard, installing new mulch in all the landscape beds around the Clubhouse.

Here is the feel-good photo of the day!  Despite the setback in weather, I couldn't be happier with where we are!

Changes in Weather...

That escalated quickly... we went from 60*F plus temperatures to a low of 14*F this morning and a nice dusting of snow.  The forecast shows things will start improving by Thursday of this week and by the weekend, we'll be back to the temperatures we've become accustomed to over the past 2 weeks!  In the mean time, this has certainly shut down the progress we've been making.  We'll be right back at it once we get above freezing!

7-Day Forecast

It's a wet morning in Highlands with over 1" of rain falling in the early hours of the morning.  Intense winds also brought down its fair share of debris.  Cold temps to follow but warming by the end of the week!

Water Testing

 

Click the image above to enlarge!

This lab based in Palo Alto, CA uses a laser particle counter to breakdown how many solids are in the water and specifically, the size of those particles.  This is important because we work very hard through topdressing and greens aerification to create larger pore spaces by incorporating sand.   On a larger scale, think of the rootzone (the sand) of a green like a jar of marbles.  The marbles have all lots of air space between them for water to move through the system.  Now take something finer, like M&M's and dump them into the jar of marbles.  The M&M's settle out between the marbles in what once was used for grass roots and water movement.  Now take something finer than that...and hopefully you see that we can wind up real trouble if we aren't aware of what is ending up on the turf.  Eventually, all the pore spaces will be clogged and water will just sit on the surface, unable to move downward.  At this point, fungus damage is going to be an issue because of excess moisture and the greens will ultimately fail.  Not to mention, they won't be fun at all to play on because they'll become soft and slow.  As a superintendent, this is one of the most important objectives we manage.