Irving Park Sprigs 6-29-15 (Day 10)

We are now 10 days into the sprigging process and here is what we are seeing.  For the most part the first seven days were as good as we could have expected.  We got good quality sprigs and put them down in timely fashion.  Soil conditions were very good at planting time due to two days of heavy aerification prior to planting.  Softened soils made it easier for the sprigs to be cut into the ground and easier to water to penetrate the soil once the sprigs were cut into the ground.  The final day of planting we received .7 inches of rain and have received an addition 1.6 inches of rain since then.

Day 6 #15

Today we are beginning the drying out process ahead of schedule.  With a slightly dryer surface we are beginning to roll all the sprigged areas in an effort to improve the quality of our first mowing, which we expect to take place towards the middle part of the week.  We will begin mowing at a height of 1 inch and will lower that slightly every  3-4 days.

Day 10 #15 Being Rolled

Once the fairways are all mown we will then begin to fertilize everything with a quick release Nitrogen source, which will be thoroughly watered in immediately following the application.  This process of reducing mowing heights and weekly fertilization will continue until we are down to our standard mowing height and all the areas are fully covered.

Some areas will naturally grow-in quicker than others.  Some areas that take poorly will eventually be sodded once we determine whether or not they will fill in on their own.  We are seeing some areas that were either to thinly planted, washed during recent rains or have been too droughty to establish that will require small amounts of sod.

The simple fact we have had a good take on the sprigs thus far leads me to believe we will be able to get at least part of the course open in the three week period discussed prior to closing the course and we should have a fairly good playing surface after six weeks, which is a pretty good turn around for our region.

Sprigs Down and Establishing

Current Update 6/23/2015
After two long days of preparing damaged areas for new sprigs and two long days of planting sprigs we have finally gotten to the grow-in phase.  The team that worked on the actual planting of the sprigs was a combined effort of both the golf course maintenance staff and the golf operations staff and everyone did a phenomenal job for what can only be described as extremely hard and dirty work under very hot conditions. Speaking of hot, the weather thus far has been near ideal for sprigging with daily highs well into the nineties and a few timely rain showers.  The first two weeks of the grow-in phase will primarily consist of keeping all the sprigged areas at or near the saturation point 24/7. Each and everyday will be spent making sure all the areas are kept in a near flooded state.  This is accomplished by running small irrigation cycles every hour of the day. As we go through the process and the sprigs begin to develop new roots the frequency between cycles will be slowly decreased.  If all goes well the sprigs will develop a sufficient amount of roots by the third week of the grow-in that we will be able to begin to dry the course out to the point we can once again start mowing everything. The mowing phase of sprigging is also very difficult to watch.  As the course is saturated throughout the first two weeks of the process it is very difficult to mow areas in close proximity to the sprigged areas. With the heat, the water and all the fertilizer the unaffected (non-planted) areas near the sprigs will grow to very tall heights in between mowing cycles.  Therefore, once we do begin to mow non-sprigged areas we will have to raise mowing heights to prevent majoring scalping and there will still be certain areas that will remain wet and as such tracking from mowers is all but impossible to avoid.  We will begin mowing the actual sprigged areas, most of which are in the fairway, at a height of 1 inch.  We will begin mowing these areas sometime in the 3-4 week timezone depending on their level of root establishment. It will take another 2-4 weeks before the new growth will allow mowing heights to be returned to more suitable playing levels.  If all goes well we would expect to see a much more presentable course by the first week of August.

Sprigs Day 1

Sprigs #13 Day 5

Sprigs #1 Day 6

When Will the Course Open and What Should Members Expect to See
Just six days into the process it is still too early to set a re-opening date.  The date will be predicated on how well the sprigs are progressing and whether or not the course will be playable.  Playable for this purpose would mean that golfers can retrieve their balls from the sprigged areas and will have a reasonable area to take relief. We expect to make a decision on how and when the course will be opened by the second week of July and will communicate our decision to the membership in a prompt fashion once such a decision is made.

Greens Aerification
The abnormally hot weather has been great to try and establish nearly 9 acres of new Bermuda sprigs but the cool season Bentgrass greens have begun to show signs of stress.  As a precautionary measure we decided not to core aerify the greens at Irving Park as was originally scheduled.  Core aerification of Bentgrass greens during extremely hot spells like the one we are currently entrenched in will do more damage than good.  Removing the cores from the greens and topdressing with large amounts of sand would result in a lot of unnecessary abrasion and stress, which could hasten the onset of decline. As such, the decision was made to just solid tine aerify the greens and defer any topdressing treatments until we see a cooling off period.  As this hot spell is much earlier than normal for our region we have also raised the mowing heights on the greens at both courses, which will result in a slower green speed.  We will continue to monitor weather conditions as they relate to the greens and will make the proper adjustments if we see the current temperature trend change in either direction.

1/2 inch solid tine aerification

1/2 inch solid tine closeup

Sprig Week at Irving Park

Sprigs
The week to install sprigs on the Irving Park course has finally arrived. As of today, Monday, June 15, the course is officially closed.  Monday and Tuesday will be used to try and prepare all the damaged areas for sprig planting through cultivation and proper irrigation.  The first step was to fertilize all the damaged areas with a good starter fertilizer, which has a high phosphorus analysis that will help with initial root growth. The next step will be to aggressively aerify each of the damaged areas. Depending on soil conditions some of the areas will be aerified as much as 4 or 5 times.  Once the areas are loosened with the aerifiers they are watered to prevent them from drying out too much. The last step, just prior to sprigging will be to apply the proper rate of weed control to keep these highly cultivated areas from being over taken with summer weeds such as Crabgrass and Goosegrass. This application will take place Tuesday afternoon and will be the last item to go onto these areas before sprigs are placed on the ground.

The actual sprigs are scheduled to go out Wednesday and Thursday.  We plan to sprig approximately 1,000 bushels/acre.  All our sprigs will be placed by hand.  In addition to our Irving Park staff we will be using numerous outside golf shop staff as well as staff provided by an outside contractor.  All in all, we plan to have 35 people available on Wednesday and Thursday to spread and plant the sprigs.

Once the sprigs are spread we will go behind and cut them in with a set of disks and a roller.  Sprigs above ground can survive if kept saturated but the sprigs that do best are definitely the ones that get pinched into the soil.  The final step is to turn on the water and keep it turned on for several weeks. We will plan to back the water off these areas once the sprigs begin to show new leaf growth and set new roots.  We expect the saturated phase of the sprigging process to last a minimum of three weeks.

Damaged Area Pre-Prep

Beginning Aerification

Multiple Aerifications

Keeping Aerified Areas Moist

Hand Spreading Sprigs

Sodding
Just because we are sprigging doesn't mean we have stopped making repairs via sod installation.  We have another truckload of sod scheduled for delivery Tuesday morning to make additional repairs to the #5 and #7 green complexes at Irving Park.  We also have a truckload scheduled for delivery on Wednesday morning to the Farm course for repairs to holes 11-15.

Sod Prep #7 Irving Park

Sod Prep #5 Irving park

The Work Doesn't Stop There
While the course is closed for repairs we will remove a large Oak tree to the left of #1 white tee at Irving Park.  We have struggled for numerous years with turf quality in this area and this year the shade damage was very significant.  As we will be required to repair this area with a significant amount of sod we felt it is was prudent to remove the tree prior to making these repairs.

Dead Turf and Tree Removal Left #1 Tee Irving Park

And Lastly, how about this weather?  I guess all the Superintendents around here said a few prayers for warmer weather and it has definitely been answered.  The hot spell is definitely a welcome trend but as both our courses have Bentgrass greens 95-100 degree weather for an extended period of time in Mid-June is quite the conundrum.  But no one likes to hear people whine so we will just suck it up, keep working and do the best we can.  Such is the life of a Golf Course Employee or so it seems as of late!

Beginning Repairs And Setting The Schedule

As we enter this final week of May the picture for what needs to be accomplished over the next several months is much clearer.  While the two courses have shown slight improvement, the amount of damage the original plan laid out for repairs has not changed much.  The plan is a two part equation.  The first part of the equation is to continue laying sod on each of the two courses in areas where sprigs are not practical.  The installation of sod will likely continue until the middle part of August.  The second part of the equation will involve sprigging large portions of the Irving Park fairways in addition to the Farm driving range and chipping fairway.  

On the Irving Park course we have estimated we have close to 8 acres (1/3 of the total fairways) that will require sprigs to be planted in order for them to fully recover by late summer.  Sprigging the Irving Park course will require the course to be closed for approximately 3 weeks.  Closing is necessary because the sprigged areas will require significant cultivation prior to planting and significant watering following planting.  The 3 week minimum period is necessary in order to allow for frequent daily watering and to keep all traffic off these areas while they are extremely soft to the point of being nothing more than deep muddy areas.

The repair to the Farm Practice facilities will begin the week following the Carolina Amateur. This will require a combination of sprigs and sod work and will therefore require the practice hitting facilities be closed starting July 15 and will remain closed until establishment is far enough along to allow the staff to hand pick the practice balls. The practice putting green will not be closed throughout this time frame. 

Schedule

June 15 - Close Irving Park for Sprigs

July 13 - Close Farm Driving Range and Chipping Fairway


Farm Course Update

The initial stages of work on the Farm course have centered around repairs to the thin areas of Zoysia, the practice tee and the chipping fairway.  In the first few weeks the staff worked to replace turf along the edges of the greens. Due to the fact that sod comes in from the sod farms at a high height of cut the staff made the extra effort of cutting sod off the 18th fairway to use on damaged areas around green surrounds. The sod that was removed from the fairway was then replaced with new sod from the sod farm.  Zoysia is very finicky when it comes to lowering the height of cut.  If the height is lowered too quickly it will scalp and thin out.  Therefore time must be spent to slowly lower the height in small increments. So by removing grass from an existing fairway you not only have instantly playable grass in an important playing area of the course but you also make it much easier logistically for the staff to get from sod farm height (.8 inch) to fairway height (.475 inch) by having all the high cut sod in one place. 

Once the worst areas around the greens were repaired the staff focused on course conditioning throughout the course for approximately 2 weeks in order to get the course in the best possible condition for the Men's and Women's Member-Guest.  The week after the Men's Member-Guest the staff began working on a few small drainage projects where Zoysia had declined due to excessive wetness.  This will give these areas a much better chance of survival when the new grass is eventually put back in these areas.

New Drainage

At the same time the staff also began removing the dead grass from the back 1/3 of the practice tee and a short area of the chipping fairway.  Both of these areas will be replaced with the same Zeon Zoysia that exist throughout the short cut areas of the course.  The idea on the chipping fairway is to give members an area to hit short chip shots and bump and runs off the same grass that exist around the greens on the course.  By converting the back portion of the driving range we hope to achieve a hitting surface that is consistent with the fairways on the course and is more cold hardy than the existing Bermudagrass that makes up the hitting surface of the tee. As the divots on Zoysia are slower to recover than the existing Bermudagrass this portion of the tee will be managed so as not to allow excessive wear.  The remaining front 2/3's of the tee that is covered in Ryegrass will be repaired in July once the entire range is closed for repairs.

Dead Turf on Farm Range Tee

Turf Removed for New Zoysia

Preparing for New Zoysia Approach at Chipping Green

Once the above mentioned areas are repaired the staff will begin to move out onto the course to begin sodding damaged areas in the rough.  Our goal is to repair approximately 2 acres of damaged turf by the early Part of July.  Anything left unrepaired prior to the Carolina Amatuer will be dealt with in the middle part of July or the early part of August.

Irving Park

To date we have put out approximately 20,000 sf of sod on the Irving Park course, which consist of a combination of Meyer Zoysia, Tall Fescue and Bermuda.  Areas we have made repairs to include the 13th green surround, 15th green surround, and the number 6 green surround.

#6 IP Sod Prep

#6 New Meyer Zoysia

The next areas on the list will include the green surrounds on holes 2 and 10, which is slated to go out May 28.

Damaged Grass Ready for Removal #10 

Damaged Grass Ready for Removal #10

Going Forward 

To sum it all up, it will be an extremely busy summer going forward. Every week the members should see a slight improvement over the previous week. Every week the staff will be busy laying sod or planting sprigs.  Every week extra man hours will be spent hand watering and fertilizing new sod.  But despite the extra workload placed on the staff every week the staff will be committed to making course conditions outside the damaged areas as playable as possible so that the members and their guest can enjoy their time spent on the two courses.  While we know course conditions are not what everyone expects or would like to see we would ask for your understanding as we work hard to get the courses back into their best possible condition.

Substantial Cold Weather Damage

Most golfers who have lived here for long know Greensboro sits right in the middle of the transition zone.  The simple definition of the transition zone as it relates to grasses is the fact that neither warm season or cool season grasses seem to thrive except for a few months out of the year.  A clear illustration of this condition has become very noticeable this year with large stands of the warm season Bermudagrass showing significant signs of cold weather damage at courses all throughout Greensboro and surrounding counties,  Every course has it own unique site characteristics but a few of the ones that have the biggest impact on cold tolerance of warm season grasses are as follows:

Warm Season Grass Type and Variety Cold Tolerance Ratings
Zoysia - High
Common Bermuda - Moderately High
Common Bermuda Improved Varieties (Vamont, Latitude 36, etc.) - Moderately High
Covered Ultra Dwarf Bermuda - Moderate to moderately high
Hybrid Bermudas (419, Tifsport, etc.) - Moderate
Non-covered Ultra Dwarf Bermuda - Moderately low
Centipede - Low
St Augustine - Low
Paspalam - Low

Other Site Conditions - An excessive amount of any of the following conditions will result in a weaker plant with a shorter root system, which will have a negative effect on the plants ability to withstand very cold conditions:
Poor Drainage
Excessive Shade
Compaction from High Traffic
Winter Traffic
North Facing Exposures
Short Mowing Heights

Cold Weather Symptoms on #13 Irving Park Course

With the small amount of information listed above put together with the month of February, 2015 being 10 degrees below average, a late freeze on March 28 with temperatures dropping to 24 degrees and a very cool month of April it is not hard to understand why large areas of our Bermudagrass this year have either succumbed to Mother Nature or in the very least are extremely slow to come out of dormancy.

What We Are Seeing - April 28,2015
It has become quite apparent large portions of our shortly mown Bermuda are showing signs of damage ranging from complete kill to just the top portion portion of the plant showing damage to healthy plants that just have not greened up due to cold soil temperatures.  The Irving Park course is showing signs of damage on approximately 9 acres of Bermuda turf.  The Farm course has fared much better than Irving Park as a large percentage of the shortly mown areas are planted in Zoysia. Where there is Bermuda and it falls into one of the site conditions listed above there is some damage. The amount of damage on the Farm course measures out to be approximately 1 acre. Unfortunately, this does not include the practice facilities.  The practice tee, the range landing area and the chipping fairway are all showing signs of damage ranging from significant down to just a delayed green-up.  The amount of damaged turf currently showing signs of damage within the practice facilities measures out to be approximately 7 acres.

What Are We Doing In Response To What We Are Seeing
1) The first step has been to closely observe areas showing signs of damage in an effort to begin to formulate a repair plan. The next step has been to measure the affected areas.  Based on those measurements we have began to formulate early cost estimates and are in conversations with our sod supplier to ensure they can meet our needs.  This is especially important in a year with widespread damage that will result in critically low sod and sprig inventories.

2) The second step is to begin applying cultural management techniques that will assist the grass wherever possible to come out of dormancy and to begin to fill in and effectively shrink as many damaged areas as possible.  The will include fertilizing a little earlier than normal, aerifying earlier than normal and keeping soil moisture at an optimal level.  Beyond that we just need soil temperatures to increase to allow the warm season plants to take advantage of improved growing conditions.

3) We then plan to begin sodding some of the worst areas in the next few weeks that are in the most important areas of play, such as around greens.  From there we will try to remain patient and wait for the warmer weather to arrive and give us a better understanding of exactly how we need to prioritize our repair efforts.

4) Finally, if the worst does come to be true and areas too large to sod remain in place we will develop a schedule to sprig certain parts of the courses during the middle part of summer to take advantage of peak warm season growing conditions. If and when a formal schedule is produced the members of the club will be notified.

Summary
Unfortunately for everyone Mother Nature has dealt us a tough hand on the golf courses and golfers at courses all throughout the Piedmont will experience less than optimal playing conditions for the early part of the year up and to the point the plant can recover or the repairs are made.  Going forward we will work closely with the leaders of the club and other involved parties to develop an ongoing strategy that will return the course to conditions the members of Greensboro Country Club have come to expect over the past many years.

Concluding A Few Small Projects ...... Douglas Lowe, CGCS

With the onset of spring the crew is back on the course in an effort to finish up a few small projects before the grass once again begins to grow.

Bunkers

The staff on both courses has been working hard to fine tune the bunkers.  The first step has been to probe the bunkers looking for areas where the sand depth is either too thin or too thick.

Where the bunker was deemed too thin new sand was brought in to bring the depth to an appropriate level (4 inches on faces and 6 inches at the bottom).  When new sand was added to the face of the bunkers that sand was moistened and tamped to reduce the potential for plugged lies in the face of the bunker. Lastly, the bunkers are now being raked with a slightly different method referred to as the Australian Method of raking bunkers. The faces are raked by leveling and/or brushing the surface to create a smooth finish.  The bottoms of the bunkers and slightly up the slopes are then hand raked in a tradition manner.  By not loosening the slopes of the bunkers each time we rake bunkers these areas are allowed to firm up to further reduce the potential for plugged lies in the faces.

Wetting Slope Prior to Compacting

Compacting Slope 

Australian Finish

DRT Pavilion 

New plants were recently added to the backside of the Donald Ross Terrace in an effort to soften the view of the large white painted brick wall.  The plantings included Mary Nell Hollies, Drift roses and Daylillies.  This area was especially difficult to plant due to the large amount of infrastructure below ground in this area.  The first hole that was dug resulted in the discovery of a large concrete slab that had long been abandoned and buried beneath the soil.  The next three holes resulted in the discovery of various electrical cables that had to be cut, redirected around the hole and lastly re-spliced.

Relocating Electrical Wires

Digging Up Abandoned Concrete Slab

New Planting

Additional Screening Material on Hole #6 / US 220 widening 

As the construction continues on Hwy 220 it has become clear additional screening material will be needed to reduce both the view of the traffic and noise from the expanding four laned highway, which is in effect moving closer to the course.  Nearly 40 additional plants were added to this area. The new plantings included numerous evergreen species such as Osmanthus sp., Cryptomeria sp., Aborvitae sp., Ilex sp. and Loblolly Pines.

Carlson Dairy Road Crossing

The cart path intersection at Carlson Dairy road was recently marked in high visibility thermoplastic stripping as an additional precautionary measure for vehicular traffic.

Ballmarks - Setting the Example

Did anyone see either of the hole-in-ones shown below at this year's Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship?  If so, did anyone notice the etiquette displayed by both these professionals when going to retrieve their balls.  Many of us would easily lose site of the need to locate our ballmarks and properly fix them and might find ourselves rushing to retrieve our glorious hole-in-one ball. Not so with Rory McIlory and Miguel Jimenez.  As the television coverage clearly showed they both calmly strolled towards the green and when they approached the hole the first thing each of them did was to seek out their ballmark and repair it for the players following behind them. 

Miguel Jimenez Repairing Ballmark after Hole-in-One

It's pretty clear tour players understand the importance of properly repairing their ballmark every time. But repairing ballmarks is not only for the professionals.  All golfers should understand the importance of seeking out their ballmarks each and every time they walk onto the green.  Repairing your ballmark is Course Etiquette 101 and it stands to benefit all those who follow behind you.  A properly repaired ballmark leaves a smooth surface and heals in much less time than one that has been left unrepaired.  As we approach the robust playing season of 2015 let's all make it a goal and a priority to fix our ballmarks (and one more) each and every time we walk onto the green.