Carts on dormant Bermuda grass

Helping Bermuda grass enter winter as healthy and strong as possible is one of the key tactics for preventing spring dead spot. The last couple of months we have been trying several combined strategies to increase the hardiness of the turf in the fairways and new tees. Already this fall we have applied the organic compost, Orgro, to the fairways to aid in spring dead spot control, we have applied fungicides, and we have made an application of potassium to the fairways. The final step that we will take is to restrict cart traffic from the Bermuda grass for the remainder of the winter.

Carts are a very stressful thing to turf grass. Whether it is cool season rough or the warm season fairways, the constant traffic causes damage. In the summer, heat stressed rough grass that is driven on can die or turn brown for some time before slowly recovering. In addition, turf that is too wet or has standing water on it can be severely damaged when driven on.  Most of the time, the turf grass plant is able to withstand the wear and recover nicely.

Bermuda grass that is entering dormancy or is already dormant does not have the same ability to recover. While the plant may be able to withstand the damage early in dormancy, the growth rate is so slow that recovery may be until the following spring. Similar to the rough, when the Bermuda grass is too wet, driving a golf cart across the turf can cause damage. The most severe damage can occur, however, when the ground and plant are frozen.

Dormant Bermuda grass turf is not growing but it is still alive at the crown and underground rhizomes of the plant. When the dormant, frozen part of the plant is crushed under the weight of a cart, the cells within that portion burst. This in itself does not actually kill any living tissue, but the effects are seen in the spring when the Bermuda is trying to come back out of dormancy. Rather than being able to regrow from the leaf tissue, the plant must regrow from the crown or from the below ground rhizomes. This can significantly set the recovery back. It takes far longer for the turf to regrow from this point than it would from other tissue. This damage can occur when the ground is dry or waterlogged.

Since control of spring dead spot can be very sporadic and difficult to predict, we also try to limit any other factors that may contribute to slow spring green-up. Removing carts from the fairways is one of the easiest of these factors to accomplish.

See you on the course!

Joe

jvillegas@bwrc.org