On Schedule

As the days pass by we are continuing to stay on track and on schedule with the work we are doing. Each day has provided us with a different set of challenges of which the staff has responded well each time. Without our staff being as dedicated as they have been and willing to put in the hours the project would not be where it is now.

After today we have 11 of the 18 greens with their final float on them before being fumigated next week. In addition to that today we have started the process of solid tine aerifing the approaches to help prepare them for Methyl Bromide.  

Nine green continues to move along at a slow and steady pace. tomorrow we should have the drainage installed in the green cavity along with the gravel layer being spread. After that rootzone will be spread and floating can begin. Once those items occur, my staff will reinstall the irrigation around the green complex.

Weekend Update

The first full week of renovation work has come to an end and we have made great progress along the way. We have met our week long goals and are in great position for the upcoming busy week.

Over the weekend the work slowed a bit with smaller crews in each day, but still we making steady progress. As mentioned before now that the large scale work has been completed we are focusing on the smaller detail work such as green/approach tie ins, sprinkler adjustments, amending approaches with compost and now expanding focus into fairway renovations as well. Tomorrow will be our final application of herbicides to cleanup Poa in the fairways which will be followed by multiple verti-cuttings and aerifcations. This will all be followed by seeding and topdressing of the fairways to complete the renovation process in this area.

Following green and fairway renovation will be tee aesthetic work, This will include minor tee leveling, adding about 2.5 acres of maintained turf around the tees as well the installation of concrete curbing.

Day Five

With every passing day we are getting closer to our next deadline. Today nothing especially exciting took place on the course, mostly detail work that will make a difference in the overall outcome of the project.

Today was similar to yesterday with focusing on green/approach tie ins along with irrigation head raising and leveling. Our final two greens were also floated out today, all of them have been at least floated once. Over the next eleven days they will all be floated out multiple times ensuring the grades are correct and any minor imperfections eliminated.

Nine green continues to slowly move along, more rough shaping took place and two drainage basins behind the green were installed today.

We will be back at it in just a few short hours working towards meeting our project goals and timelines.

Day Four

Another busy day came to an end with great progress taking place once again.

The final two greens have been rototilled and six greens have been floated out for the first time. Today one of our big focuses was working to tie in the approaches to the greens, this has been challenging due to the amount of material loosened up from tilling and making sure to get everything back in place. This tie in is extremely important to have perfect so that any ridges and unevenness is not present therefore not effecting golf ball run up to the greens.

Today we also worked on raising and leveling all sprinkler heads at the greens locations. This will help improve head performance and reduce the possibility of seedling damage due to excessive water washing next to the head.  

Day Three

Another great day of work took place on the course today. The final five greens and approaches had the sod stripped from them, This will allow us to complete all of the soil amendments to be added and rototilling to take place at these greens complexes.

Greens 1-8 and 10 have all been floated once and several have been floated several times. Each time the green is floated the contours become more defined and will replicate those found prior to the renovation work.

Verti-cutting was accomplished on two more fairways today getting us through the first five holes. This process will not take place tomorrow due to a scheduled fairway herbicide application to control the Poa Annua. On Friday weather permitting verti-cutting will resume.

Work on nine green continues at a slower pace than I would like due to irrigation components that need to be moved before and dirt can be moved in a few areas. Over the next few days the pace should pick up and the new green will be taking shape.

Day Two

Much like yesterday things are going well and on schedule. Sod removal from the greens is moving right along, today another seven greens and approaches have been stripped. This leaves us with five greens and approaches to complete tomorrow.

Today rototilling has taken place on four greens complexes and six greens have had their first float done on them.

Expanding in our renovation work, fairways had the process of verti-cutting started, This was done on the first four holes. We are going an inch and a half deep which is bringing up a ton of material, this process will be done 2-3 times before being aerified multiple times and then eventually seeded.

Day one is in the books

After nearly four years of planning the day finally arrived in which the actual work began.

Today we got off to a good start with six of the greens and approaches stripped completely of turf. Four of the greens and approaches were rototilled and two of the greens have been floated back out. We have put our self in a great position to hit our timeline goals, but I am still realistic that we have a long way to go. Great effort by the entire team today.

Below is a video of what could possibly be my new favorite piece of equipment. Meet the Rotadarion.

A New Begining

It has been a long time since updating my blog due to my real time information being posted on twitter. As we begin our green renovation tomorrow I will once again be posting regularly with pictures and information as to what is taking place during the re-grassing process.

Hopefully I am able to effectively document our little project beginning in 15 hours.

What We Do

Here's a great video put together by the Philly AGCS.

Pouring Concrete

It's only fitting to have a post on the last day of 2013 in a year of infrequent posting.

Today concrete was finally flowing and progress is slowly ramping up as we get past the holidays that have slowed us getting out of the ground. Footers were poured today which will now allow the forming of foundation walls to begin on Thursday. Our next pour is scheduled for this coming Monday.

Today's Action

Demo

Talk about stress relief, nothing is better than smashing stuff up to blow off some steam.

My staff was truly disappointed when they learned we would not be demoing the 5 out buildings at our facility. Some things are better left to the professional destroyers.  These guys have made pretty quick work of removing the old buildings and done it an organized surgical like manor.

The building materials are being separated in to three categories; wood, steel and concrete.  All three components are being recycled individually to minimize any waste materials ending up in landfills.  

 
Here is a video that shows the precision of the material separation.

Maintenance Facility Improvements

It has been a long six months since my last posting and there is no better time to catch up when the outside temperature is 3 degrees.

For more than 2 1/2 years we have been working towards major Maintenance Facility improvements and today we have finally received our building permit. The process included numerous meetings with County Officials, Fire Marshals, Architects, Contractors, Neighbors  and more than twenty building design iterations before coming up with one that will work for everybody.

Every step of the way we seemed to run into a new challenge in the process, many were anticipated and several were not.  After this long process I am looking forward to finally after 18 years of working out of a dirt/mud parking lot having a quality facility to protect the substantial investment of our equipment fleet.

Currently we have only 6000 sqft of enclosed building space, this also includes office and equipment repair areas that cuts into the overall square footage.  The new building will be and additional 8000 sqft that will allow us to get our entire fleet inside and out of the elements. With more than $1.5 Million dollars invested in our equipment fleet this new building will go along way to maximize the life of our equipment.

Throughout the construction process I will once again post regularly with progress, here's to normal weather conditions over the next several months.

Below are some current pictures that show our yard area that most of the equipment sits outside and the renderings of what will be.

Aerification Post Mortem

Aerification is always a difficult process to go through without something major going wrong mechanically or weather related. This year we had both come into play with the weather being the major disrupting factor.  Normally we are able to complete aerification in three long days of the  greens, tees, approaches and fairways.

Below I will layout out our Spring 2013 three day timeline of aerification.

April 8^th

Verti-Drain Greens 1-12

Aerify Fairways 1-6

Graden Tees/Approaches 1-11

Topdress/Seed Fairways 1-5

April 9^th

Verti-Drain Greens 13-18

Aerify Fairways 7-15

Graden Tees/ Approaches 12-18

Topdress/Seed Fairways 6-13

April 10^th

Aerify Fairways 16-18

Topdress/Seed Fairways 14-18

Topdress/Seed all Tees/ Approaches

Below this is the timeline of how Spring 2013 aerification actually played out.

April 8^th

Verti-Drain Greens 1-8

Aerify Fairways 1-6

Graden Tees/Approaches 1-11

Topdress/Seed Fairways 1-4

April 9-10^th

Snow on the ground

April 11^th (still snow on the ground)

Verti-Drain Greens 9-16

Graden Tees/Approaches 12-18

April  12_th

Verti-Drain Greens 17-18

April 15^th (snow starts mid day)

Aerify Fairways 7-11

April 16-18^th

Snow on the ground

April 21^st

Aerify Fairways 13-15

April 22^nd (snow starts mid day)

Aerify Fairways 16-18

Topdress/Seed Fairways 8,10,11&13

April 23-24^th

Snow on the Ground

April 29^th

Topdress/Seed Fairways 7,15,16&18

Topdress/ seed all Tees & Approaches

Final cleanup

Winter Injury Guide

I have put together a quick little guide book for our membership to understand some of the winter turf injury sustained on the golf course this season.  Some of the injury is intentional, some is desired and some is not. Either way the guide shows in basic terms what each injury looks like and the cause of it.  Sometimes  Mother Nature provides the best selective herbicide on the market. 

Winter Injury Guide

Crown Hydration:  Occurs when large amounts of surface water from snow melt turns into ice crystals outside the plant cell (extracellular) of the Turfgrass crown tissue. As these ice crystals form and enlarge, they pull water out of the cell, which will result in dehydration. At some point a dehydrated cell and cell membrane stop functioning and the result is cell death. Many times superficial damage occurs but If enough of the cells in the crown of the plant die, the entire Turfgrass plant will die as a result.

Figure 1 Hole #5 1st Fairway Under Trees

Figure 2  Hole #6 Fairway and Rough Sheet Water Flow Areas

Desiccation: Winter desiccation is the death of leaves or plants by drying during winter when the plant is either dormant or semi-dormant. Desiccation injury is usually greatest on exposed or elevated sites and areas where surface runoff is great. Tree root completion for water also affects the quality of the Turfgrass.

Figure 3 Hole #7 Exposed South Facing Mounds

                                                                   

Figure 4 Hole #4 Tree Root Competition For Water

Selective Herbicide Kill: Selective herbicides kill specific targets, while leaving the desired turf species relatively unharmed. We are using both older and newer chemistries to control Poa Annua in our key playing areas.

Figure 5 Hole #7 Fairway Poa Kill

Figure 6 North Chipping Green PoaCure Trials

100,000

It is crazy to think I started this blog 5 years ago with the intention of using it to better inform my membership of the things taking place on the golf course. This blog has grown from a local target audience to something that has reached more than a 140 countries world wide.

Reaching a 100,000 pages views is mind boggling especially given where all the views have come from.  This world wide exposure has allowed meet and interact with some great people sharing stories and ideas.

Hopefully I can continiue to produce content that keeps you wanting to visit, but this gets harder with each passing day.  Last year I started using Twitter for more real time and quick hitting items but still plan on using the blog for more detailed descriptions of relevant topics. Looking forward to the next 100,000!! 

Same Time Different Year

What a difference a year makes is a common theme many Golf Course Superintendents are saying. First off it's true the weather could not be more different this spring from last year. By this time last year we had mowed greens several times, aerified all of my fairways and we had nearly 350 rounds of golf. This year we are O for three on these items and with the long range forecast looking sketchy, it's hard to say when things will starting acting like Spring around here.

 The funny thing is that weather pattern we are currently experiencing is more normal than not, over the last several seasons we have been treated to extremely warm early spring temperatures. Those temperatures were great to get things going, but then the inevitable hard freeze would hit putting the brakes on active growth. The turf may have been green but it wasn't happy or growing for a while after that. This year is shaping up to be a slow start of the season with soil temperatures being 5 to 10 degrees cooler than this time a year ago. We as Superintendent's routinely try to manipulate Mother Nature, some times with success and sometimes with disaterious results. The key is knowing when to push things and  knowing when to back off, it's a fine line that is walked at all golf courses that deal with seasonal Turfgrass.

Knowing that the Masters is coming in a few weeks and all that comes with the green is good mentality might tempt you to make a poor agronomic decision based on color alone. Don't do it, exercise patience within reason and remember this is a marathon not a sprint.

The Diversion

Ever since the bunker renovation took place on the golf course back in 2007 we have fought washout issues with some of the flashed sand faces.  This was to be expected and construction materials such as Geo textile  liners were utilized to help reduce the washouts, which they did for the most part.

Our most problematic bunker on the course from a washout standpoint was the left hand fairway bunker on the 18th hole.  We knew durring construction this we be an issue and did all we could given our financial limitations at the time to divert water flow.  What was done was not nearly enough and with recent talk about eliminating this bunker because of the labor drain to maintain it, we jumped into action.

 In my opinion this is a critical bunker that defines the tee shot on the closing hole and without it a key architectural and strategic element would be lost. 

During the renovation work we took great care to tie our re-grading into the existing contours and make the work appear to have never happened.  This was a challenge due to the fact we brought in nearly 200 yards of soil for this bunker alone. The end result is one that beefed up the bunker faces and a creation of a mound and swale to divert surface sheet flow of water around the bunker and not through it.

This bunker now has both form and function from an agronomic and architectural point and maybe instilling a little fear in the golfer as this being something avoided at all cost.

The Problem

The Result of Sheet Flow

The Solution Before/After

Fall Projects

It is amazing how quickly time has gone by since my last post.  We have been extremely busy the last two months taking full advantage of the extended fall weather completing numerous construction/renovation projects.

Immediately after aerification was completed in early October we have been in full renovation mode working on drainage improvements, bunker and tee renovations and a major landscape enhancement at the restroom on hole #4.

The work this fall alone we have completely renovated in house a total of 9 tees and 6 bunkers.  Although we have done a lot we still have a long way to go to complete the long term renovations in these areas.  We have a total of 82 tees of which all need varying degrees of work ranging from leveling, drainage,irrigation, new rootzone mix, tee expansion and re-grassing. This fall we have started with the most problematic and heavily used tees so that an immediate impact is made for next spring. As time goes on we will work through all of them in order of usage by both the men and women until all of them have been re worked.
New Rootzone Mix Being Installed

Final Prep Before Sod

After Sod Installation

Old Rootzone Mix Removal

Final Grade Before Sod

Sod Going Down

After Sod Installation

A similar process is being followed in regards to the bunker renovations taking place on the course.  We are identifying the most problematic bunkers from the greens out completing these before moving on to fairway bunkers. In 2007 we had a major bunker renovation of all 50 bunkers that allowed us three plus years of great sand quality and conditions. Unfortunately in the last two years in particular we have experienced numerous significant rain events that has repeatedly washed out and contaminated the bunker sand and drainage systems. With the work that was started in the spring of the year we now have renovated a total of 16 bunker and are on are way.  The renovation of each bunker includes; removal of the old contaminated sand and drainage followed by Klingstone liner being applied and new drainage and sand installed.    
Washed Out Sand Contaminated With Silt

New Drainage Trenches

Klingstone Being Applied

Final Product

One of the other projects that was recently completed was the landscape renovations at the restroom on the fourth hole.  This was previously a native grass area that always looked worn and had a negative aesthetic appeal. This newly landscaped area will serve two purposes now the first is a major aesthetic improvement with the incorporation of trees, shrubs and perennial flowers. The second function this landscaping will provide is some much needed screening from the development road that is directly adjacent to it.

Newly Installed Plant Material

This renovation work should greatly enhance your overall golf experience come spring time and if the weather cooperates there will be several other surprises waiting for you when you return next year.

Tee Work

Now that aerification has been completed and the mowing of the golf course is slowing down we have begun some of our fall projects.

We will be working on several things such as drainage, irrigation expansion, Sodding, bunker renovations and tee leveling. Most of our seasonal staff will only be here for a few more weeks so we will be working as quickly as possible on the large list of things to get done before the weather changes.

The tee leveling will be one of the first things we get started with since they are the most time sensitive items. We need to have the new sod installed within the next two weeks to give the sod a chance to become established before the long winter sets in. The tees we will be focusing on are the 5 pine on #2, The upper 2 pine on #4 and the 2 pine on #9. These three are the worst of the worst and this creates a great starting point for us moving forward.
Sod Being Removed from #2 5 Pine

Ready For Regrading On #9 2 Pine

During construction these tees will be out of play and the tee markers will be placed on nearby tees of similar yardage.

The Journey of a Grow In

For anyone who has grown in anything on a golf course or anywhere for that matter goes through a wide range of emotions through the process.  Like many things in life there are ups and downs along the way that help shape the journey.

In the beginning there is a tremendous amount of excitement and anxiety all rolled into one knowing that the success or failure  lies squarely on no one else's shoulders.  The excitement of what could and will be is the motivating factor from day one up until the completion of the grow in.  The excitement of seeing your first germination as predicted based on environmental conditions and years of agronomic experience. The pride that you feel when your protocols are producing exceptional results.   The impatience you feel when the seedlings are not growing fast enough.  The doubt  you feel when things don't  respond in the manor  you wish. The worry you feel when you push too hard and it causes a step backwards. The relief you feel when things get back on track and once again. The amazement  you feel  when literally watching the grass grow before your eyes as if it were a time lapse. In the end  the satisfaction of knowing that you created something that will be enjoyed by many people.

These are just some of the emotions you will go through during the growing process, some days you just might even experience them all in one day I know I have.

A Look At The 4 Week Old Turf

Receiving a Little Personal Attention