We are working to remove as much of the straw that we can now that the Fine Fescue seed has geminated on holes #3 and #13. The straw was initially placed over the soil to hold moisture to allow the seed to germinate. It is rather unsightly and the areas look better once we rake a majority of it off. The straw that remains, will naturally decompose.
The greens are really starting to look good and I am happy to report that our soil temperatures are finally warm enough that Creeping Bentgrass is on the move. We've lowered the height-of-cut on our greens from 0.160 to 0.140. Tomorrow we will start walk-mowing the greens daily with the height of cut being lowered ever 2-3 days until we get to about 0.125". Our greens rolling program has already commenced and it won't be long before the greens are really rolling true and fast. The photo above is one I took this morning while the hole location was being moved. All that white sand that's incorporated amongst the old sand and organic matter is most impressive. These types of aggressive practices are what makes a USGA spec green last a long time. Without this kind of disruption, the life of a USGA green can be as short as 15 years before reconstruction is necessary.
Above, a company out of Franklin, NC is here today restriping the parking lots at the Clubhouse, Practice facility and then the line that goes through the tunnel.
For the next 3 days, you'll see a gentleman with 3D scanning equipment set up around each green. We are are surveying the greens and the green surrounds to collect topographic data for each putting surface on the golf course. The scanner above surveys the putting green by oscillating back and forth for about 20-30 minutes. It collects millions of data points that will then be mapped on paper to show us precisely how much "pinnable area" we have. This analysis will also let us know exactly how much sand would be needed to raise a portion of the green in order to gain a pin location; the front left of #14 green is a prime example. As you can see by the settings, it collects a data point every 0.200ft vertically and every 0.020ft horizontally as it crosses the green. This data is very useful for a number of applications that I will talk more about in the future.