The recent dry weather makes our job very difficult on the golf course. Our irrigation system is lacking to say the least, so for us to deliver the beautiful golf course everyone expects, we have to perform a lot of extra labor to provide that. You can see in the picture above, the sprinklers do not cover many areas so we run a portable sprinkler to deliver the water to where we are lacking on the course. Many times we are running the sprinklers on the main playing surfaces like the fairways and tees. We have many tees on the course that have no irrigation at all from the system. In addition to the lack of water deliver from our system, we have a golf course that is predominantly sitting on ledge and shallow bedrock, so we apply an extensive amount of water just to keep the turf growing on the rock underneath.
The problem and the trick to watering the golf course is to apply just enough water so the turf is still firm and playable but not too dry that turf is lost. The problem occurs when too much water is applied, sacrificing playability and allowing disease pressure to increase. Please understand when you see a browned out spot out there on the fairways or tees, it is a result of us trying to provide the best possible playing conditions without having any standing water on the course, as you can imagine, this is an extreme juggling act with the irrigation system and mother nature!
Mike O'Neill GCS
