What is next? Post Aeration, Landscape Enhancements......

Post aeration update:

 

The greens continue to heal well with many of the greens at Day 17 of post aeration. The weather has almost been perfect with above normal temperatures and timely precipitation and the smoothness of the greens continue to improve daily. Yesterday, the Grounds team was able to mow, brush and groom the surfaces multiple times along with a heavy sand topdressing to aid in smoothing of the greens. Today, the team will be out mowing in the early afternoon to achieve a clean cut of the stood-up turf from the brushing yesterday.  Over the next week we will continue to lower mowing heights, apply plant growth regulators to help with density and ultimately aid in improved playability. Thank-you for your continued patience, the turf is almost there!

Christo- Rolling the 18th

Day 14-Post Aeration 

Other Initiatives across the grounds at HP include:

 

Erie Avenue Landscape Enhancements: Bryan Miller, Horticulturalist is excited to start this week planting over 200 plants that will enhance the first impression coming into the club.

Rough Inner Seeding: Over 6000 lbs. of turf type tall fescue seed has been placed in the ground with the final touches being wrapped up this week

Innerseeding of rough

 

Greens Height Nursery: trials have begun again of new varieties of creeping bentgrass; our focus is on new cultivars that provide a high level of heat and ware tolerance, improved texture and disease resistance. 

School Visits- In the off-season our team’s focus shifts slightly with a focus on recruitment of the next turfgrass professionals with visits to both colleges and high schools. It offers our team opportunity to give back to the programs that we have partnered with offering a hands-on learning environment along with providing insight of other topics that might not be covered in the curriculum.

Class Tour from Cincinnati State

H2-B Guest Worker Visa Program: Our team members from Mexico are leaving next month to return to their families. We can’t thank them enough for their hard work over the last months, they are integral part of our success! We have already begun the paperwork for next season to have our same team back with us for a seventh year!

Bryan with our team from Mexico

Tee Aeration: We will begin the annual tee aeration this week with a minimal impact to play.

 

High Rough Areas: A second mowing has been completed in many areas of the high rough, herbicide applications will start this week to keep these areas weed free as possible for next year.

 

Continuing Education/Tournament Volunteering: Over the winter months our team will continue to grow with continuing education at various conferences, or they will have the opportunity to assist in the preparation for a PGA event. Recently, I had the opportunity to help a friend and a former classmate from Penn State to prepare the course for the 40^th USGA Mid-Amateur at Sankaty Head Golf Club in Nantucket, MA.  CJ Penrose and his team leading up to the event were challenged (like so many others in this industry) with a lack of labor. However, the lack of labor did not impact the quality of the golf course that was played by the field. The conditions were excellent in all areas, with outstanding feedback from the players and the membership at Sankaty Head. The opportunity to volunteer at events such as this provides a behind the scenes look at how courses are prepared for tournament play along with providing an opportunity to incorporate similar strategies into our operations at HP.  CJ and his team were extremely organized and welcoming of all the volunteers and were willing to share many ideas, strategies and challenges.  As always, I am thankful for these opportunities to play a small part in these events.

CJ Penrose- Golf Course Superintendent 

Sankaty Head 

Thank-you,

 

Pat O’Brien,

 

Grounds Superintendent

Aeration Update

With the Founders Cup in the rear-view mirror, the team is moving to the aeration of the putting surfaces. We began the process on Sunday evening to try to complete a few greens before the next cold front comes through with potentially heavy rain. Aeration is one of the most beneficial agronomic processes to help with these 100-year-old surfaces. Each year we conduct physical properties testing of the existing greens to tell us how we are doing with the management of the underlying rootzone. These data points help us identify challenges and assist in creating a strategic plan with cultural practices such as sand topdressing and aeration.

 

Once the plan is created it is time for our team to execute, each golf course or turf manager may have a different strategy based on the conditions, availability of labor and grass types. This link from the USGA Green Section gives a general view of the ins and outs of aeration. 

At Hyde Park this year we plan to impact 8-10 percent of surface area with this aeration while incorporating about 80-100 tons of sand to a depth of 2.5”. In order for the aeration to be successful we need to have dry weather and the soil profile needs to be at an ideal moisture content, if the underlying profile is too wet there is a risk of damage from the equipment and wet sand does not work into the open holes well. The forecast has not been in our favor this week with multiple days of rain slated, which has delayed our progress. (6 greens have been completed) We will have a better idea on resumption when the front moves through on Thursday afternoon. We will continue to update the membership as we know more about the soil conditions to complete the aeration and begin the healing process as soon as possible.

 

The Aeration Process at HP

 

We utilize a large tractor mounted aerifier, the cores are left on the surface to dry and they are shoveled or pushed into piles and picked up by the team.

 

Close-up of cores 

Tractor Mounted Aerator 

Pushing Dry Cores into piles for pick-up

Sand is applied via our sand topdressers and our team will utilize various leaf blowers to integrate the sand into the thousands of holes, the blowers reduce abrasion to the plant that would be seen from utilizing a large brush to move sand into the holes.  Our goal is to fill the holes with clean sand to improve drainage, increase firmness, remove unwanted organic matter and improve overall plant health.

Incorporating Sand Into the Open Channels 

Following the incorporation of the sand, the greens are fertilized to encourage growth and rolled to smooth. Unfortunatley, the healing process in the first week is extremely slow, we are unable to mow the greens until the plants grow through the sand layer applied. Generally, with ideal growing conditions, complete recovery will take 3-4 weeks. 

Post Sand Incorporation 

Thanks for your patience while we get a little cooperation from the weather to complete the process. 

Pat O'Brien

Grounds Superintendent