Thin Greens Filling In Nicely, We Needed The Right Weather!

The photo above of the 16th green was taken May 12th.  The photo below was taken June 2nd.  A drastic difference in turf quality considering the hard work it took to get it to the picture below.  We have sodded, seeded and sprigged the green to get it to the point it is now.  The main factor that helped us is the soil temps have come up to a good point which are conducive for seed germination.  The greens that were thin will continue to fill in as we get the warmer weather and our cocktail of fertilizers continues.

Mike O'Neill, GCS

Inter-seeding Bentgrass Into Areas On Greens With Winter Damage.

Many courses in the northeast suffered very severe winter damage this winter.  We are not severe here but we do have some stubborn areas where the turf is not going to come back very quickly.  The top (2) photos are from April 16th, when we manually spiked and seeded the thin areas on the greens with A4 creeping bentgrass.  The bottom (2) photos are from May 15th when we went into these thin areas again with a slit-seeder machine that physically injects seed into a groove made into the green.  This allows for the seed to soil contact we need for effective germination of the seed.  These areas will be nursed back to health with frequent watering to allow for complete germination.  Getting some bentgrass to fill into the voids will go a long way in the future as the bentgrass is way more hardy than the poa annua that populated the thin areas before last winter.  We will repeat the process on any thin areas as we go forward in getting the greens in championship condition!

Mike O'Neill, GCS

Irrigation Problems...More Numerous Than Usual!

The Irrigation system this year has really cost us a lot of down time.  We started to fill the system 3 weeks  ago and continue to find around 2 leaks every time we try to pressurize the system.  I have blogged regarding the system before but the cold, long winter, coupled with very antiquated  and fragile piping create way more work for our staff.  I am hopeful we can get ahead of the fixes but the normal maintenance of the golf course gives us all we can handle without all the labor involved with fixing the leaks.

Mike O'Neill, GCS

Remedy For Winter Injury...Drainage!

With the winter being the toughest winter in 30 years by many reports, we can really see our weaknesses on the course.   The weaknesses in question are that of greens internal drainage.  The damage on the low spot on 16 green is a direct result of not allowing the water to drain from the green internally through the winter months.  We have recently trenched and installed internal drainage with our staff, to greatly improve the drainage, health and hence, playability of the 16th green.

 Neatly removing a thin strip of sod, to be replaced with new sod from our nursery green in the near future.

                                      Trenching to a depth of 18" to allow for drain tile install.

             We used a laser transit to allow for correct slope and flow of the drained water off the green.

Drain tile install.

We backfilled the pipe and trench with a special "Greens drainage" sand to allow for increased percolation into the drain line.

The night after we installed the line, a rain event occured and we can see the water flowing through the green and into the pipe already!

Drainage Project On 16 Green. Will Prevent Future Winter Problems.

The long, cold winter was very tough on our golf course turf, specifically the areas that do not drain.  The pictures above show the middle of the 16th green on April 15th.  Notice the damage which is a result of water standing and freezing on the green since early last winter.  This green has a low spot in the middle that does not drain much at all.  Every rain event we are out there pushing the water off the green.

The remedy for this will be the installation of some drain lines 18" down in the green.  There are companies that have done this type of drainage for clubs such as Oakmont and Baltusrol, so it is a know practice for old style push up greens.  We will be performing the project with our staff in the near future.  We will trench the pipe material into the green and run the drain off the left side of the green underground to a sump in the rough.  We will then be replacing any weak grass on the green with healthy grass from our nursery greens. The link below is the type of drainage material we will be using in the green.  Also, I have provided below, a link to a good article from the USGA on the widespread damage being seen throughout the Northeast from the long cold winter.  Most of the damage here at Bellevue is associated with the week Poa plant.

http://multi-flow.com/Menu/golf_courses_app.html

http://www.usga.org/course_care/regional_updates/regional_reports/northeast/You%E2%80%99re-Not-Alone!---April-2014/

Mike O'Neill, GCS

Long Winter, Will Show On Course Turf.

The long winter is finally starting to let up a bit lately.  We were, just yesterday, able to see some of the turf under all the ice and snow present all winter.  Yesterday we made a drastic move in trying to remove the ice and snow off of the 6th green.   As shown above, we used the front end loader to remove snow from the frozen green.  We need to get oxygen to the green as soon as possible., so with the upcoming temps , we decided to remove as much snow while we can.  The lower picture of 6 green is just with 1 day of thawing. The green had on average, 2' of snow on it yesterday, so we probably saved a few days by physically removing the snow.  The bottom picture shows the middle of the 16th green where water tends to collect and sit.  The ice present there all winter has severely stunted the turf in the low spot.  We can expect this area will take longer this spring to fill in and green up.  We still have yet to see under the ice of the 6th green but we are hopeful that when it thaws the turf will be fine.  Any thin or stunted areas on the greens will be overseeded and pushed to fill in with all means necessary going forward.  Let's think warm temperatures!

Mike O'Neill, GCS

Grounds Cart Fleet Repairs.

I know, I know, enough of the winter already.  I put an order in for good weather weeks ago!  This time in the shop, however;  is allowing us to get to all of the problems we have sitting around the shop for repairs. The pictures below show a cart that had a broken frame through 30 + years of use.  The staff fitted some round tubing and some solid welds to make the frame viable again.  We also added a small bed with some scrap metal for a blower holder or transporting small tools.  A hitch was also added to be able to tow a roller, trailer or blower around the golf course.  The forecast looks like a warming trend into this weekend.  Lets hope we warm up quickly, we need to melt the ice off of our greens that has been set up for 3 months.

Mike O'Neill, GCS