Feast or famine

We discussed last week how we have transitioned rapidly from dry to wet. So far, the trend has continued. It has been feast or famine this season in terms of rainfall, and right now we have too much.

For some perspective:

·         For the month of August, we have now received more rain than for the months of May, June, and July combined.

·         The total thus far for August is also equal to half the rain we have received this entire year! From January to July, we have had just over 12” of rain. In the last 29 days we have received 6.5”.

Needless to say, this presents problems for the Grounds department and managing the property. We have had to shovel the sand back up the edges of bunkers 3 out of the last 4 days. Some rough hasn’t been cut all week, either because it is too wet or because our labor has had to be focused on other areas.

Some areas have only been partially mowed. For example, we mowed 8 passes in the rough around greens to just stay on top of it. Last week, we cut the same portion, but we had to do it with push mowers because even our lightweight riding mowers were too heavy for the saturated ground.

The Bermuda grass is a great challenge as well. Warm, wet weather is ideal for Bermuda grass growth. We were lucky enough to get 2 cuts on fairways last week, though we pushed the envelope on some borderline too-wet areas. We also were able to mow tees and approaches twice. However, with the growth rate of the grass, they could have each used 4 cuts and we will already be behind to start the week.

Greens are the most difficult to manage during a time like this. The grass is at its weakest after a long, busy summer. Roots are short and the recuperative potential is minimal. Mow them when they are too wet, and damage will result. We don’t like to see the greens get long and perform poorly anymore than the golfers do, but we always must be looking forward and protecting the turf for the next day. We could force our mowers out and get the greens mowed, but the damage from the one-time cut could last until October. It is a fine balance deciding when to push forward and when to hold back.

We understand there can be frustration surrounding poor conditions- rough not mowed, bunkers not raked, slow and bumpy greens, another cart path only day. However, the reality is that we are working to keep the course as great as possible, for each day and for the next day too.

 

Etiquette Reminder of the Month

Please remember to remove any bunker sand that may be stuck to your spikes before walking on the greens.

Also, as part of a Golf Committee initiative to improve course etiquette, we have included links to videos teaching proper on course etiquette. Please take a moment to watch:

Ball Marks - How to properly repair

 

 

See you on the course!

Joe

jvillegas@bwrc.org

From dry to wet

The weather is the single greatest factor for managing the golf course. It determines what we can and cannot do, when to do it, and much more. We have discussed how dry we have been. Now we have moved to the other extreme.

Over the stretch of days from August 10^th thru August 20^th we received 3.75” of rain. This is slightly above normal for that short amount of time, but not outlandish. However, based on how this season has progresses thus far, this was a large deviation. That rain total was actually more rain than we received for the entire month of July. Furthermore, when totaling the entire month of August rainfall, we are just .75” of rain less than all of June and July, combined.

Because of this rain falling in a short amount of time, the ground gets saturated quickly. Most of our operation is affected in some way. It limits the amount of mowing we can do or sometimes eliminates our ability to cut for several days. We push mow some large areas in order to try and keep up with turf growth, or we skip certain areas that are extremely wet and mow just areas that can tolerate the larger mowers. Similarly, when we can mow, especially on greens, we have to raise the mowing height to accommodate the accumulated growth.

We also must refocus labor towards cleanup. Sticks are always strewn across the property after storms, especially this year with cicada branches falling in just a gentle breeze. Bunker sand gets washed of the edges after intense rainfall and it must be manually shoveled back into place. As mentioned, we may not be able to cut large portions of the property, so putting the labor towards sticks and bunkers does not necessarily detract from something else immediately, but cleanup is always a multi-day process. Eventually we have to choose between cleanup and catch-up. We must balance getting the course trimmed back down and also still getting it repaired and tidy.

We definitely needed the rain. Spreading the rain over a longer period may have been easier to manage, but we don’t get to pick.

 

Etiquette Reminder of the Month

Please remember to remove any bunker sand that may be stuck to your spikes before walking on the greens.

Also, as part of a Golf Committee initiative to improve course etiquette, we have included links to videos teaching proper on course etiquette. Please take a moment to watch:

Ball Marks - How to properly repair

 

 

See you on the course!

Joe

jvillegas@bwrc.org

Watering in plant health products

Sometimes we apply plant health materials that need to be watered into the soil to be effective. Timing these applications with rain is useful way for us to be most efficient.

We have been making periodic applications targeting soil pests or soil health all season, and in season’s past also. Normally we must use the irrigation system after the spray to move the material down to the soil. Especially when it has been this dry nearly all season. Using the irrigation system works pretty well and certainly gets the job done most of the time. But just like the grass responds so much better to a nice, cool rain, using a storm to water in our products works better too.

Rain is consistent. Our sprinklers are engineered to put out a certain rate of water, over a certain area, and we can calculate and manage this process. However, nozzles wear out, operation in the field never matches exactly to tests, and natural conditions can alter how the sprinklers operate. None of that applies to rain. It falls everywhere, at the same rate, at the same time (over an area as small as BWRC). This makes it ideal for watering our products down into the soil- nothing is missed, and everything is moved at the same time.

So, the key is trying to time these applications with rain. It is much harder than it sounds- we can’t just go spray whenever it is raining. If it is raining too hard our material could wash away. If it rained too much previously, it could be too wet to drive our machine on the turf. What if the rain is about to stop? What if the rain is too light? What if all the conditions are just right, except we are not due for an application that needs to be watered in? These are all factors in trying to get the timing correct. But when circumstances align just right, we are able to make the appropriate application on time.

We haven’t had the chance to naturally water our products in much this year. But, when we can, it is an opportunity to accomplish our goal just a little better than we can with our irrigation system.

 

Etiquette Reminder of the Month

Please remember to remove any bunker sand that may be stuck to your spikes before walking on the greens.

Also, as part of a Golf Committee initiative to improve course etiquette, we have included links to videos teaching proper on course etiquette. Please take a moment to watch:

Ball Marks - How to properly repair

 

See you on the course!

Joe

jvillegas@bwrc.org

Aeration recap

The aeration process took place last week. Some cool nights and moderate daytime temperatures helped the process. We had a few hiccups, but we were able to complete everything on time.

Our greens aeration program has been going strong for several years now. The staff knows the routine and they work hard to finish. This year everything continued positively.

The weather was the biggest influence on how the aeration process played out. Monday was a great day for aeration- a cool night followed by a cool, clear day- and nearly everything on Monday went according to plan. Tuesday is when we had to really make some adjustments. Tuesday had another cool night leading into another cool day, however, a very persistent cloud cover lasted until nearly 1pm. This made it very slow for the material we pulled out of the ground to dry, especially the fairways.

Using hollow tines removes material- thatch and soil- from the ground. On the greens, we shovel this up and remove it by hand, which is not dependent on drying time. However, on the fairways, we do not remove the soil, only the thatch. To accomplish this, we drag the cores with a steel drag mat that breaks up the soil chunks and dislodges the thatch. We then blow the thatch material out into the rough. If you try and drag the cores when they are still wet, you get smeared mud. So, on Tuesday we had to wait extra long for the cores to dry- in fact they were not completely dry when we started, but time was running out!

The result of all of this was that the fairways did not clean up quite as well as expected or hoped. A bit more soil was left at the surface than we wanted, as well as the Bermuda grass having more mud on the leaves than usual. This forced us to drag and blow, drag and blow, the rest of the week to try and get the fairways where we wanted them to be. In the end, we accomplished our goal, it just took a little while longer.

A separate but related issue we saw was isolated to #3 fairway. The cores that we pulled out of the last half of this particular fairway were nearly as hard as concrete. Due to this hardness, even repeated passes with the steel mat did not break the cores up well. #3 fairway alone was drug 11 times over 4 days. We believe two factors were at play that created such hard soil. First, we are several inches behind for our yearly rainfall total. No consistent or heavy rains have been able to penetrate the soil to the depth from which we pulled cores. Second, this section of #3 fairway was heavily altered during construction in 2014. The construction crews worked very hard to stockpile and then redistribute topsoil to all disturbed areas, but it wasn’t perfect. This area was evidently shorted some good soil. So, we pulled cores out of sub-soil with poor tilth. Although we have pulled cores before, we have only done it 2 other times to this portion, so no significant soil alteration has taken place in the past years.

 

A chunk of soil from #3 fairway. While you can't 
tell how hard the dirt is from the picture,
it does resemble a terra cotta pot.

Thank you for your patience while we performed the very necessary aeration practices this past week. Mother nature threw us some curveballs, but in the end, we accomplished all that we needed to. We are set up nicely to head into the final stretch of the season.

 

Etiquette Reminder of the Month

Please remember to remove any bunker sand that may be stuck to your spikes before walking on the greens.

Also, as part of a Golf Committee initiative to improve course etiquette, we have included links to videos teaching proper on course etiquette. Please take a moment to watch:

Ball Marks - How to properly repair

 

See you on the course!

Joe

jvillegas@bwrc.org

Insects in bunkers

Recently, there has been some concern regarding the bees that are in many bunkers. These insects appear every year and they are harmless.

The bees that can be seen in the bunkers are actually a type of sand wasp in the Bembix genus with many different species that may be seen. They burrow in the sand to make their nest, which makes the bunkers ideal. They eat flies, mosquitoes, and other small insects. They are not communal wasps like other species.

The species that occurs in the bunkers every year is particularly non-aggressive. Though research online says that in the most extreme examples, they can sting, it takes great effort to get them to that point. The Grounds staff maintains bunkers regularly and we have never had an employee stung, despite standing in many bunkers for 10–15 minute stretches.

A photo of several Grounds staff
working in a bunker with no issue

While the wasps can be annoying, no control measures are warranted. In speaking with a pest control company, there are insecticides that can be used, but it would require spreading a dust across every bunker in which the wasps are present. Not only is this not a sound pest management practice, but any wasps that were missed would shift to another bunker. Even if every bunker on the property was treated, some wasps would likely be missed, and many beneficial insects would be killed in the process. Ignoring the wasps is the best strategy since they pose no threat.

If the wasps are left alone, they will leave us alone too. No further control measures are necessary or warranted.

 

Etiquette Reminder of the Month

Please remember to remove any bunker sand that may be stuck to your spikes before walking on the greens.

Also, as part of a Golf Committee initiative to improve course etiquette, we have included links to videos teaching proper on course etiquette. Please take a moment to watch:

Ball Marks - How to properly repair

 

See you on the course!

Joe

jvillegas@bwrc.org