Venting!

A Mid-Summer Venting

Small Tine Aerification and light topdressing will occur:
June 23th

This mid-summer small-tine aerification is critical to the success of our greens through the summer months. The ‘venting’ using small ¼” solid tines allows for improved gas exchange and release of toxic Carbon Dioxide that has built up in the soil.

Where does all of the built up carbon dioxide gas in putting green soils come from? The majority is produced by soil-dwelling bacteria and fungi that consume oxygen and produce carbon dioxide as a by product of their metabolism. As the temperatures increase in the summer so does the production of CO2.This would not be a problem if the CO2 by-product had a way of escaping from the soil into the atmosphere. However, the thatch layer tends to act as a barrier for gas diffusion. Compaction further seals the turf surface, making gas escape even more difficult. This early summer venting aids in creating a healthy environment for the greens to survive and prosper through the summer.

Thank you for your patience and understanding during this necessary maintenance task. I expect that the greens will be completely healed within 7 days.

Member-guest week!

We are at the beginning of our Men's Member-Guest week and things are shaping up nicely for the touranment. In preparation for the tournament, the greens were verticut and topdressed last week to promote smoothness and true ball roll. The desired green speed for the tournament will be 11.5'. This is the speed that I think best shows the design characteristics of our greens and test the players ablity in a fair and equitable manner. Also in the latter part of last week and the beginning of this week we are making all efforts to ensure that any dry spot recieves water. This effort allows us to uniformly dry down the golf course in the days prior to the tournament. During the tournament our goal is to put out as little water as possible. The course is irrigated with the desire to produce and maintain firm playing conditions without making a hugh sacifice the the health of the plant. With temperatures forecasted in the mid 90's for the tournament we will be spending a lot of time handwatering and selectively turning on sprinklers heads in an effort to avoid any wet spots.

A few other house keeping items to note:

• We have cleaned up for the last wind storm. The broken tree behind #6 has been removed and sodded. In the weeks following the member-guest we will be assessing the current conditions without the tree there and be looking at our options going forward.
• Transition to the summer time Bermuda grass is coming along nicely. In the next two weeks we will be making a fertilizer application to promote more bermuda grass as the cool season ryegrass starts to succumb to the stress of summer time temperatures.

Best of luck to all who are playing the tournament. One saying that I have for tournaments of this size for everyone's enjoyment: PLAY WELL, PLAY FAIR, and PLAY FAST!