Testing New Chemy

So last week I sprayed fairways with the usual plant protectants. One of the chemicals has a side effect of deterring worms, so hopefully we will see a decrease in their activity especially since all the rain we have had recently. The rest of the mix had growth regulators, fertilizer, and another fungicide. It normally takes 8 full tanks to spray all 24 acres of fairways, so I typically spray them all over two days. This year I am trying a brand new chemical on a limited basis. All of number one fairway and half of number two fairway have this new chemical in the mix. The rest of the fairways and the other half of number 2 do not. I will be evaluating performance over the summer and see how it may differ from our normal chemical program.

So why mention all this? One of the effects of this new chemical should be a better looking turf overall, and so far you can see the difference in the two halves of number 2. So if you notice that half of two is a bit greener and darker in appearance, that is the reason. We will be continuing this test through our next fairway application in about 3 weeks, so it is possible it may become a very stark difference in shades.

Just an FYI.

Image is from Google Earth...

Well the bunker work is done and all the loose ends resulting from it are completed also. Now we can get back to addressing the collars, approaches, and tees where the turf is a little lacking. The rain was a huge help and now it looks like warm weather is very near. A couple of eighty degree days and things will explode... Most of the landscaping around #16 tee is in, there is still a little more to do, and it looks great.

FYI on the imminent coming of the Emerald Ash Borer... We are starting our tree inventory, 4 of 18 holes are complete. To give you all an idea of how many ash trees we have, there were a total of 262 trees counted and just over 47% of those trees are ash. I would guess the rest of the course is going to follow suite and we are going to find out about 50% of all the trees on the golf course are ash trees. There is a new chemical option for tree injection that is giving 2-3 years of control for EAB, so there is a option for the ones we do not want to lose. At $30+ per tree to treat we would be looking at over $3,700 for just the ones we have counted so far ($1850/year). Some very rough numbers on the idea of treating - 18 holes ~ 1300 trees ~ 750 ash trees ~ $22,500 treatment every 2 years ~ $11,250/year. It is safe to assume we are not going to be able to treat every tree on the golf course. But it is reasonable to choose a fair amount to treat, since we have so many ash trees there are a lot that come into play and perhaps we do not want to lose them.

Bunker Work Continues

The finishing touches are being put on #12 today and they have started renovating the greenside bunkers on #13. By shifting the front bunker to the left a little, it allows the right side bunker to be brought around the front right corner and a little closer to the green. Whenever you start digging around on a golf course you never know what kind of surprises might pop up. Thankfully, as of yet, there have been no unexpected's to speak of. We hope to have everything, #12 & #13, sodded by the end of the day Thursday. Everything should be back in play in a few weeks.

Bunker Work Commences

The bunker work has begun. The old sand was removed from the fairway bunkers on #12 and they were re-edged. New sand was put in today and they are back in play, be forwarned though that the new sand is very soft and the ball has a tendancy to plug. The left greenside bunker was ripped apart and renovated today also, it is almost completed. By the end of the week the whole hole should be nearly finished, just waiting on sod would be my guess. If there is no rain in the forecast and it is feasible, I will bring in the sod for both #13 and #12 in one shipment to save on costs...

Since the approach is getting a little work, we have stolen some sod from there and are using it to repair some of the dead spots we have on a few approaches. There was also some extra soil generated from the greenside bunkers and that is being put where the new tee box on #11 is going. That was a project that got postponed last year because there was no extra soil to work with from the bunker project, so this year we will be completing that. It will put the yardage for that hole from 190'ish to 215 or so, making it a good challenge for the championship tees. It will not be completed until this fall, so for now it will be rough graded and seeded with ryegrass.

And I want to thank everyone involved for a tremendous 50th Anniversary Party at the club last Sunday. I am so glad I got to play and be part of the celebration...

Day 44 - Rain, EAB, & Bunkers

And again I am extremely grateful for a super irrigation system! With very little rain this spring we have been pumping a lot of water onto the golf course. And though we have had the usual hiccups, the irrigation system has been working wonderfully. However, with all the wind we have had it has been a struggle to keep some of the seeded areas nice and damp. But things are progressing nicely. On that note, while most poor fairway areas are showing signs of good re-growth, there are some approach and collar areas that we plan to cut and sod next week. For the most part I have been pleased with the recovery of most of the golf course, excluding a few areas here and there.

Emerald Ash Borer (EAB) has been in the local news on a daily basis now that it has been found in St. Paul. How does that effect us is on a lot of members minds I gather, considering all the questions I have had in the past couple of weeks about it. There is no question it is devastating to any ash tree population, literally killing every tree, and we have a high population of ash trees. In fact the majority of trees on the golf course are ash trees, so when it gets here it will open the golf course up considerably. Our plan of attack right now is to inventory the golf course trees and start determining any "key" ash trees that we should consider chemical treatments for. This will start amongst the greens committee and go out to the board and membership from there. Preventative treatments have come down in cost, so it is reasonable to consider some for treatment but not a high number of trees. The best thing we can do is follow that course of action and start treating key trees to help prevent their demise. And along with that, let nature follow its course and deal with the tree removal when it comes to that. We could have it now, though I have seen no signs of it yet, or it could be many years before it makes it our way. The big thing is to not panic and start making any rash decisions about dealing with the high number of ash trees we have on the golf course. I will definitely keep everyone posted as to what we are doing in regards to the whole issue.

Bunkers, bunkers, bunkers. The project is starting early this year, next Tuesday as a matter of fact. Holes 12 & 13 are being renovated this summer, with some more work being put off until the fall. As usual there will be some minor tweaking to all the bunkers, the fairway bunkers on #12 will just have the old sand taken out and new sand put in. There will not be any moving, adding, or removal in that area. The greenside however will get some dramatic change with updated bunkers and a slight pinching of the approach. The work on #13 will really bring that hole into light. The fairway bunkers are being moved slightly more into the fairway and the second one will be brought in a little closer to the first. The willow tree along the pond will be removed and the fairway cut will be extended to within six feet or so of the pond edge. The greenside bunkers will be shifted slightly, with the right side bunker being brought in to the green closer and more towards the front right corner. The fall work which is tentatively planned right now would be a complete regrading and seeding of the 13th fairway. This would eliminate the drainage issues we have in the fairway, allow us to kill the predominantly poa annua fairway and seed in supreme blues, and make a much more playable surface. The winter kill that fairway suffered is a perfect example of how poorly the water moves through that area.

I apologize for the lapse in updates, I will do a much better job going forward. With EAB, minor projects, and everything else there is plenty too talk about.

Day 1

Well the season has officially begun for IVGC. And the picture here of hole 6 is what you can expect from a lot of the course. There are quite a few brown spots in the fairways, all of which can be attributed to the ice cover and water pooling from the winter. A lot of the collar and green edges show signs of desiccated turf, and number 16 has a couple of large turf areas where water collected and froze, damaging the turf. The covered greens (1, 7, 8, 15, 16, & putting green) are very green and the turf looks good, other then the spots mentioned on 16. All the other greens look typical for this time of year, some spots worse then others.

The biggest thing now is the need for warm weather. It will probably be a few weeks before we truly know how some of the brown areas will recover. Odds are many of them will come back in some fashion, probably thin and sparse. At that time we will be doing everything we need to do to get things back in shape. Aerifying, seeding, topdressing, fertilizing, etc... So here's hoping for some warmer weather very soon.

Quick Update

Well I think 99% of the snow and ice are gone (for now anyway). The warm weekend and the first couple of days this week have taken care of any ice cover we had on our greens. Dave and I have been out that last two days moving the softened ice and pooling water off the green surfaces. Even with 4 solid days in the 50+ range of temps we still had to chip through about 3 inches of ice on the front of number 18 yesterday. The whole exercise has given us a great understanding of the drainage issues some of our green complexes have. Thankfully we only have a couple of greens with spots where the water will pool if it can not drain through the soil profile. And we have also taken care of some drainage problems with the continuing bunker project.

Nice weather and little snow always creates excitement for the season to start and the course to open. During weather stretches like the one we are having now I always get asked by a few when the course will be opened. Well, if we can get a good couple weeks of this weather and dry things out good, it could be sooner then later. I think most agree there is still more snow to come, even if short lived, and that just means it will take longer to dry out. We are all hoping for an early spring this year and definitely a warm one, so we'll see...