Verticutting and topdressing greens

Today we verticut and lightly topdressed greens.  These processes are vital to the long term success of our TifEagle ultradwarf bermuda greens.  TifEagle has characteristics that make these processes important: grain, organic matter and thatch production.  The verticutting will help to thin out the green surface encouraging more growth and a tighter surface as well as fighting the grain.  The topdressing fills in the verticut lines as well as diluting the organic matter and thatch the greens produce.  Diluting the thatch and organic matter with sand is important because thatch and organic matter tend to hold water like a sponge instead of letting the moisture flow through it.  When water can flow through the top layer of the green the surface dries out and firms up faster.  This process results in a firmer, smoother playing surface.  The pictures below show the process.  After the sand is applied, it is drug in and the green is ready for play.



verticutting the green






green after verticutting




topdressing the green



green freshly topdressed

Sunday

Superintendents Revenge
I had a good time setting up for this MGA tournament.  I hope all who played had fun with the crazy set-up.  Back to normal today.  No more cups in the collers for at least a year.

Pre-emerge application
The pre-emerge application that got started and rained out on 2/13 is almost finished.  Thanks to all the members who on one of the busiest Sundays I have seen in a while, put up with having an application made on the golf course.  This was the best option we had for completing the application.  The purpose of a pre-emerge herbicide application is to kill the weeds before they are seen.  When it works out as planned this application greatly reduces the amount of weeds on the golf course that have to be treated post-emergent, or once they are visible and an eye-sore.  Pre-emergent herbicide does not have any effect on weeds that are already established.  Those have to be treated with different products, which we are doing when the weather allows.  

Mother Nature's Revenge

At 6AM we had .5 inches of rain.  At 7:30AM we were up to 2 inches.

#10 creek

#6 bunker / new pond

#8 bunker washouts

CART PATH ONLY

Falling Rain and Felling Trees

On Monday we recieved another .65 inches of rain and more is expected throughout the coming days.  Feast or Famine.

We have cut down 10 dead trees on #2 and #3 this week.  There are 20 less red X's on the golf course than we started the winter with.  These pictures are actually not from a tornado, though it probably looks like it.

Short Update

Just as the golf course was starting to dry out Mother Nature blessed us with another 1 inch of rain today.  According to the newest Drought Monitor which was released yesterday, our drought status has been downgraded from Exceptional, which is the highest rank, down to Severe.
We completed work in both bunkers on #10 earlier this week.  We also have started painting fixtures on the golf course such as the 4x4 fairway posts and ballwasher poles with more to come.

new black paint on top, unpainted below

Saturday rain

We received another 1.25 inches of rain on Saturday, February 4.  The bunkers that we have changed the sand out in have performed well with the recent rains.

Bunker work

One of our projects this winter is improving the conditions of the bunkers.  We are removing the dirty contaminated sand and replacing it with new white sand.  Where needed we are also repairing and or removing the fabric liner that is in the bunkers.  All of this will help to improve the playability and drainage properties of the bunkers.  This is an ongoing process and to date we have completed work in the bunkers on #14 and #4 and are currently working on #10.


#4 before



#4 after

Bay Oaks Golf Course Maintenance Blog

The purpose of this blog is to help communicate to our members at Bay Oaks Country Club what we as a golf course maintenance team are doing.  I plan to update the blog periodically with maintenance practices, golf course conditions and relavent topics.  This blog will grow and develop as time goes on and will serve as an additional source of communication in addition to the periodic updates we are already sending out.