Aerification

Well its that time of the year again... Aerification!!!. Here at Minor Park Golf Course we have started the process of punching holes and picking up plugs! We are hoping that the weather will cooperate with us so we can get this done within the next couple of days and get Minor Park back open for play. This morning we were able to double verticut greens and then starting at 4:00 tonight we are in the process of punching holes. Here are a few pictures of the process:

Double verticuting to help eliminate some unwanted thatch

David (My Assistant) running the Procore

Picking up plugs with the core harvester

Vandalism at Minor Park

We had some vandalism overnight on a few of our greens and tee boxes.  The putting green and tee box #4 got the worse of it.  We had to strip out a spot on the putting green and replace it with sod from our Nursery green. The black marks where they decided to burn out on the green have been left for now to see what the turf does in these areas.

Damage on Putting Green

Turf removed and replaced from nusery green

 

 

 

 

 

 

Frost Damage

As we begin to get later into December and the start of the new year we will begin to see a lot more frost mornings.  I just wanted to post a picture of what frost damage does to the grass if you walk out on it. I know frost in the morning is an inconvenience and not many people like to wait for it to clear so they can play. But if we can stay off of it until the maintenance staff can give the all clear, we hope to see less of these pictures in the future.

Time To Put The Zoysia To Bed!

As I sit here writing this, I look out my shop window and see a nice blanket of frost throughout the course.  With Temperatures getting low enough for frost and the highs just cracking the 60's and 70's the warm season Zoysia will start to shut down and proceeded into dormancy for the winter.  About Mid- September we applied a fertilizer application of 5-10-31 to harden the zoysia off.  About a week later we mowed our fairways and tees for the last time.  If you have played lately you probably notice that they are getting tall.  We do this to help protect the crown of the plant so when it goes through the brutal Missouri winters ( the ones we usually get unlike last winter) it will be protected and allow for less winter kill of Zoysia when it comes out in the Spring.

 

The Month of September was greatly welcomed in by myself and my hard working staff. I would like to thank everyone on my staff for the hard work they showed during the hottest and driest summer in quite some time.  With the cooler temperatures we have received over the last month, we were able to get out 2000 pounds of tall fescue seed into our rough that was badly hit with the no rain, high temperatures and lack of irrigation coverage.

 

Now is the perfect time to get out and enjoy these nice days and perfect course conditions at Minor Park Golf Course. I look forward to seeing you on the Golf Course.





 



 

 

 



Root Pruning #9 green

I began to notice some major decline of the collar on number 9.  When I got here in February, this area was bare so we sodded it from the sod that was on the existing nursery green before we rebuilt the nursery green 2 months later.  With the temperatures being so hot we were on a regiment of watering greens with overheads in the evening and mornings consisted of watering spots and collars then light cool down runs in afternoon.  We have been doing this process for the last 3 months and this area kept declining.  I decided to see if it was a problem under the turf.  I dug a small hole right next to the collar and noticed 3, 1 inch sized roots about 3 inches below ground.  This finding lead me to believe that the 2 trees that are near the green was stealing the water before the turf could take it in.  Here are some photos of the spot in decline and the 2 trees by the green.

We borrowed a walk behind trencher and proceed to root prone about a quarter of the way around the green.  What this process will do is sever the roots that are into the green and in about 2 days those roots will stop taking water from the green.  We have noticed that some of the spots on the green are starting to bounce back after this process.

Digging the trench around the green to sever any roots that are into the green.

The open trench we found a lot of surface roots and rock.  The roots started about 2 inches below the surface.

In the process of filling the trench back in and then replacing the sod back on it.

Finished Product

Tenacity spray on 13 fairway and cool season tees

About 3 weeks ago we sprayed a product called Tenacity on our cool season tees and 13 fairway to control the goose grass and crabgrass in our turf.  What this product does is shuts down the plants HPPD an enzyme in the biosynthesis of carotenoids.  This enzyme protects the chlorophyll, the pigment in plants responsible for photosynthesis from too much light energy.  Without carotenoids, light destroys chlorophyll causing new growth to turn white resulting in death of plant.  As we mow the white becomes less and less visible as it kills the grassy weeds Here are some links to information on Tenacity:

Active Ingredient
Whitening of Weeds

 Crabgrass Whitening off on Cool Season Tee

New irrigation controller installation

As you can see from my previous post we have installed all 110 heads that service the greens and have proceeded to move onto new controllers to replace the old SBM 1230 pin and dials with new Par plus digital controllers.  We currently have 5 completed out of 9 and are hoping to finish those within the next month.

 

 New Pad for new irrigation Controllers

 Splice box where old controllers were located and the new controller on pedestal.

Pile of concrete from old controller pads.  Concrete was 14 inches thick and had to use jackhammer to get out.

Old controllers and new pad location

Finished product before back filling of soil