The Other Side of Covers
Update 11-19-08
Courses across the north-central tier of states have recently completed the annual tasks of winterizing the irrigation system and applying snow mold fungicides to high priority playing surfaces. With cold, snowy weather looming, many superintendents now wonder if there are any other options available for protecting the course from winter-related damage during these final few weeks of late fall.
A moderately heavy application of sand topdressing made after winter disease protection is applied is not a bad idea, regardless of where in the Region your course is located. The sand provides a fairly good level of protection from wind desiccation during an open winter and the addition of more sand into the upper root zone helps dilute excess organic matter accumulation that occurs between late fall through mid spring. In addition, just about any type of geotextile cover can help prevent damage to turf across open, elevated, windswept greens or tees that have a history of winter desiccation.
On the other hand, I cringe when inquiries are made regarding the use of winter covers on greens at golf courses located along the southern border of the Region, for example the Detroit area. The winter climate along this portion of the country is far too unpredictable and, in my opinion, the problems associated with a surge of excessive growth that could occur under a cover will always outweigh any protection from crown hydration the fabric may provide. Covers tend to perform best in areas where there is little risk of an extended mid-winter thaw.
That being said, don’t be afraid to cover a poorly drained, localized area of a green that dies year after year due to crown hydration or prolonged ice cover. After all, what’s the risk when you are sodding or plugging a portion of this green every spring anyway. Under these conditions, the use of a wood fiber mat or an insulated waterproof cover over the injury prone area of the green is worth a try until the underlying problems associated with poor surface drainage can be addressed by reconstruction or through modification of the surface contours.
Just keep in mind that you need to look past the advertising hype associated with green covers, particularly in areas of the Region where a period or two of mild winter weather is likely to occur before spring. If a product is likely to cause the turf to break winter dormancy, you may be better off covering your backside, by not covering your greens.
Better Late Than Never
Updated 10/13/08
Walk into any maintenance facility and there’s usually a big calendar above the superintendant’s desk that is crammed with notes about sprayer applications, outings, and other various records or reminders. In days gone by, a big circle around a date in early September would typically designate the day set aside for coring the greens. With increasing frequency, that bold circled date tends to be found closer to Columbus Day or Halloween instead of Labor Day.
There are plenty of sound agronomic reasons why later summer is better than late fall when it comes to cultivating the greens with hollow tines at courses across the north central tier of states. High soil temperatures during late August/early September encourage the holes to heal over quickly. On the other hand, forget about holes healing over after a few hard frosts occur. Greens that go into the winter with thin, bumpy surfaces will enter the spring with thin, bumpy surfaces; and spring is a time when cold soil temperatures slow down the rate of recovery to a snail’s pace.
To be fair, there is no shortage of non-agronomic reasons to schedule an aggressive hollow tine coring as late as possible. The temporary disruption to play was and continues to be the prime reason why coring is pushed to the shoulder season. In today’s economy, the loss of revenue associated with closing the course for even one day and then annoying golfers for a week or so comes in a close second. After all, we hope for a dry, mild, sunny day to complete coring operations, and those days are golden when a couple of soggy spring weekends put a big crimp into the season’s cash flow.
What to do? Why core at all? Granted, there are a few, and, I do mean a few, golf courses that topdress greens perfectly and manage the turf in a manner that makes aggressive cultivation unnecessary. However, I don’t need to take my shoes off to count the number of times during the past 18 seasons that I have made verbal or written TAS recommendations to omit hollow tine coring for greens. In my experience, those who have had the smarts, experience, and luck to manage great greens without any cultivation also have been honest enough to admit that they may need to, and will, initiate a coring program in the future if problems such as layering or reduced water percolation occur. In contrast, there is another group who never core and are in denial regarding serious soil problems, which ultimately becomes the next superintendent’s concern.
There are many reasons why greens need to be cultivated regularly. Excess organic matter accumulation in the upper soil profile is high on the list. Topdressing will dilute any additional buildup of organic matter, but the existing thatch needs to be physically removed by some form of aggressive cultivation. Hollow tine cultivation is ideal for addressing a thatch problem because removing the cores from the playing surface is a relatively simple process. Don’t chop up the cores and recycle some of the organic matter back into the greens when the purpose of cultivation is to eliminate thatch. Filling the holes with sand provides a smoother surface and accelerates the rate of recovery.
As mentioned above, late fall isn’t the ideal time to cultivate greens. However, when excess organic matter is a problem and the only two choices are late coring or never coring, then go ahead and core. Understand and communicate the potential problems of late cultivation to golfers. Make the extra effort to fill the holes with sand in hopes of providing a smoother surface next spring. Filling the holes and leaving a little extra sand on the surface may also help reduce the potential for wind desiccation during an open winter. Halloween coring just may result in some Thanksgiving should wet, hot weather occur next summer.
Speaking of Thanksgiving; you don’t want to miss attending the 43 rd Annual Wisconsin Golf Turf Symposium being held the week before this holiday on November 18-19, 2008. This year’s topic is water, and experts from across the country will discuss critical issues such as wells, best management practices for irrigating golf turf, water quality, water treatments, modern irrigation system technology/innovations, permitting, pond issues, water rights, water conservation and much more. Everyone who manages turf can learn something from this unique educational opportunity…not to mention the excellent meeting facilities at the American Club. Call the American Club ASAP for reservations (800) 344-2838 and mention the Turf Symposium – don’t wait if you want the great rate. Contact my office or Shelley Biro at Milorganite (800) 287-9645 for registration information. SBiro@milorganite.com
Source: Bob Vavrek, rvavrek@usga.org or 262-797-8743
On The Dry Side
Updated 9/16/08
A comprehensive member survey was taken at a highly regarded course recently, and it revealed that members with a 5 or higher handicap were relatively content with the overall playing conditions. In contrast, the course conditions did not meet any of the expectations of the less than 5 handicap players. The greens weren’t fast enough, smooth enough, or firm enough. The roughs were too short, the bunkers had too much sand, and the tees and fairways were too soft. The obvious conclusion is that the few highly skilled players at the club are never happy with course conditioning even when the majority of golfers are clearly satisfied.
I noticed a similar “glass is half empty” attitude from low handicap players at a recent Turf Advisory Service visit. The new superintendent has done a great job keeping the course exceptionally firm and dry - a considerable departure from past management practices. Greens and fairways have been pushed right to the edge of moisture stress and it wouldn’t be a stretch to say some of the playing surfaces had the appearance and consistency of Cheetos; you know, kind of orange and deep fried to a crackly crunch.
Considering that the two complaints expressed at nearly every golf course visit are (1) the bunker conditions are inconsistent and (2) the fairways are too wet and soft, I fully expected the golfers to be ecstatic about all the extra roll they were getting on the rock hard turf. Much to my surprise, it didn’t take some of the mid-to-low handicap golfers very long to complain about those #!&*$ hard fairways.
Many of their less-than-perfect drives were now rolling and bouncing into fairway bunkers; hazards they usually managed to avoid when the fairways were wet and soft. The prospect of having to execute very long sand shots to reach the greens has some players pining away for the good old days when the turf squished beneath your feet. Fortunately, the majority of players look forward to the extra roll on fairways, though the jury is still out regarding how well they like the firmness of the greens. This experience supports the conclusions drawn from the aforementioned member survey; that some golfers are never happy.
By the way, there was one group of players who were quite vocal about what they consider to be significantly improved fairway conditions. Interestingly, it’s a group that is usually hesitant to make any comments regarding course conditioning. You are correct if you guessed the ladies. Most don’t have the same ability as men to drive the ball a great distance and really enjoy the extra roll when just keeping the ball moving down the middle of a firm fairway.
All in all, it was nice to see an old classic course being played as it was intended to be played. Golfers have the option to run the ball up onto the putting surface and a player who can put backspin on the ball has the advantage over the player who cannot.
There were still some gripes from members who believe the course must be emerald green to be healthy and that the grass is slowly being killed by the superintendent. No doubt, there will be some moisture stress injury to localized areas of turf dominated by Poa annua from time to time. Good communication can minimize the annoyance of a little dead turf. In any event, it was amazing to find that some of the old push up greens in shaded sites only needed to be watered once a week during midsummer as long as a little hand watering was applied in a timely manner.
Most superintendents have never taken the time or have not been given the opportunity to push the turf to the edge of stress with stingy irrigation. Keep in mind that an extra effort was made at this course to aggressively core greens, tees and fairways during spring and fall as a prerequisite to cutting way back on water. No doubt the extra coring improved root growth and reduced the potential for developing localized dry spots when irrigation was decreased.
Golfers at this club finally have what they claim to have desired for years - a firm, dry course. Whether or not they are willing to accept brown grass versus lush, green grass remains to be seen.
Source: Bob Vavrek, rvavrek@usga.org or 262-797-8743
Pick a Patch
July 15, 2008
Despite a cool spring, we knew that it was only a matter of time before hot, stressful weather would arrive across the upper Midwest. Right on the heels of the heat and high humidity were brown patch, take-all patch, and summer patch. Each disease has been seen with regularity during the past few weeks and each has its own unique personality.
Brown patch tends to be more of an annoyance than a serious threat to golf courses in northern states. Ask around and no one seems to have ever seen it actually kill turf. Besides, it’s easy to diagnose and fairly easy to control with most contact or systemic fungicides.
Summer patch is the forgotten disease on many courses. Still a serious threat to turf, but it has been overshadowed by more glamorous and ominous sounding diseases, such as Waitea patch, bentgrass dead spot or rapid blight. After all, you get no sympathy from the neighboring superintendent when you mention you have plain old summer patch on fairways. On the other hand, rapid blight sounds really serious. First of all, it’s a blight - a blight beats a patch, just like a full house beats a straight every time. Furthermore, it’s rapid and what could possibly be worse than a blight that’s rapid. That name alone has to make the green committee increase the fungicide budget by at least $5K to $10K.
Last, but definitely not least, is take-all patch. It never takes it all, but that name scares many into thinking that some year…it just might. Diagnosis isn’t all that easy. In many cases you send a half-dead sample to a lab and ask if there is any take-all disease on this turf and the answer is usually yes. No smoke rings, no mushrooms, no black spiny acervuli and no webby mycelium to count on. Even when you are confident of the diagnosis and have tracked the disease on a few of the same greens for several years, it disappears and appears on other greens this season. The same goes for fairways, the disease was right there like clockwork during the 3rd week of June for the past three seasons and darn if it doesn’t show up somewhere else this year.
Maybe take-all scares people because it only affects bentgrass. Bentgrass is good. We would probably care less if it was only affecting Poa annua, since we pay good money to kill Poa with growth regulators and herbicides.
Take-all has to be the fungicide distributor’s dream disease. Treatments require high rates of expensive fungicides applied to turf during late fall and early spring, well before any symptoms are observed. Better yet, it’s kind of hard to tell if the treatments are working since the disease can be here today and gone tomorrow. However, it is easy to sell the preventative program to the golfers; after all it’s called take-all patch, not take-some patch.
Source: Bob Vavrek, rvavrek@usga.org or 262-797-8743
Holes from Hell
Updated 6/15/08
Golfers’ expectations may change over time, but one constant is their universal distain for holes in the putting surface caused by hollow tine core cultivation. The grousing over this temporary annoyance has forced many superintendents to postpone core cultivation until play subsides during late fall.
Better late than never may be an appropriate saying when paying taxes, but not so appropriate when greens are cored during late October/early November. It makes good sense to core early enough during fall to provide ample time for the holes to completely heal over by winter. Partially closed holes can make the greens more susceptible to desiccation during a harsh, open winter. More importantly, holes that are open going into winter may not recover until late spring or early summer when warm weather decides to continue hibernation until June.
Many courses that counted on warm spring weather to accelerate hole recovery were more than a little disappointed this season. Cool days, cold nights and frequent hard frosts were responsible for unusually low soil temperatures across the upper Midwest during April and May. As a result, open holes in greens were a common sight right through June.
Open holes are always an annoyance to players, but more so during spring when they are especially eager to start the golf season. Completely filling the holes with sand then rolling the greens will reduce the amount of surface disruption and prolong the beneficial effects of cultivation. However, there is no substitute for favorable soil temperatures when it comes to encouraging turf growth during spring and fall.
The first week of September is the upper Midwest’s traditional time to cultivate greens for a good reason…soil temperatures are high and the surfaces heal quickly and completely before the first few hard frosts and short day length inhibits the topgrowth. Hopefully the holes from hell seen on many greens this spring will encourage more courses to reconsider their questionable policy of postponing cultivation until the last possible minute before snowfall.
Source: Bob Vavrek, rvavrek@usga.org or 262-797-8743
Be a Skeptic
February 19, 2008
Cold snowy days provide a bit of time to catch up on office reading of the trade journals that have piled up on my desk this past summer. You can’t help but get caught up in the hype of glitzy advertising. The outrageous claims of some products never cease to amaze me. The current presidential hopefuls could certainly take some lessons from "spin" placed on product performance, or lack thereof.
My spin of the day is the claim that one product "measurably outperformed" another in a university trial. Ok, grab your Stimpmeter and check the speed of the carpet in your office and measure, say 13’ 6". Now check it again from the exact same spot and gee whiz, it’s 13’ 8". That’s a measurable difference that means absolutely nothing, except perhaps that your carpet has now "measurably outperformed" itself.
There are measurable differences, statistically significant differences and, more importantly, meaningful differences between various turf management products. Be sure to ask for university based research data before making a significant investment for a new, unproven product. If all you get for your inquiry are testimonials then beware.
Don’t hesitate to call the principal investigators of the research study. Most will be more than willing to discuss their opinion regarding the effectiveness of a particular product, which may be quite different from claims found in advertisements. Be wary of graphs and charts that illustrate effects without reference to statistical differences.
Furthermore, statistics can be misleading. Books have been written on this subject. For example, you have an inch of dense thatch on your fairways. A research study clearly indicates that, over time, product A or treatment B reduced thatch accumulation by 10% and the difference was statistically significant. Yes, we have a measurable difference. Yes, we have university based research that demonstrates a statistically significant reduction in thatch. However, is there a "meaningful" difference worth the cost of the product? Probably not, since after all is said and done, you still have 9/10 of an inch of thatch on your fairway.
The bottom line is that you must justify the cost vs. benefits for any product or maintenance operation. Does it "work" just isn’t good enough in today’s economic climate of stagnant or decreasing operating budgets and ever increasing golfer expectations. A product must be effective and cost effective.
Source: Bob Vavrek
USGA Senior Agronomist
Telephone: 262-797-8743
