Course Update July 20
On Monday, July 27th the agronomy team is planning to vent greens. This is a practice of making a very small hole with either a solid tine or a very small coring tine. The practice of venting allows gases to exchange from the soil and allows oxygen to enter the root zone. Venting also provides an area for water and nutrients to go. In essence, this process helps infiltration over a short period of time. Venting is a key cultural practice for putting green success over the stressful summer months. Unfortunately, this season we have experienced problems to both our green aerators and have only been able to vent all the greens once this season and a few greens twice. With both aerators seemingly operational right now we hope to get back on schedule July 27th with a venting we had planned back in March. We do have some play now on the the 27th that will need to be worked around, but the hope is to still vent all greens in one day. Please remember the practice of venting causes virtually no disruption to ball roll and often there will be a slight increase in speed following this necessary practice.
While on the course a member recently talked to me about ball marks. The member stated "He recently played a public course and that course had far less ball marks than our greens" Please remember we are a very active golfing membership. On a day to day basis we do more rounds than a public course especially during the Tuesday - Thursday period of the week. Couple this with the fact that a private course member will hit more greens in a round of golf then a public course player and the ball marks will quickly add up.
The membership could definitely be doing a better job of fixing ball marks and fixing them correctly. This past Wednesday morning the first green I went onto was the 9th. I stopped counting at 40 unfixed ball marks. Below is a short video of that green.
Also a lot of ball marks are being fixed incorrectly. Here is a picture tutorial of how to correctly fix a ball mark. Please note you never want to pop the center up as this will result in the ugly brown mark that is so prevalent on your greens.
Below is a link to an article and a video on the do and don't of ball mark repair.
A new addition to our equipment fleet was recently delivered. A new Toro 5800 sprayer has arrived and once fully calibrated will start to be used. This addition valued at over $90,000 will help in applications to our fairways and rough. Really maximizing the efficiency with which we can treat these areas of the golf course.
