Golf Course Superintendent Ready to Answer Any Questions You May Have

[ChaosTheory]

On 10/11/2024 at 8:30 AM, ThinkingPlus said:

What is this "spring and fall" aeration you speak of? Around here at the local muni they aerate about every 10 minutes. They just did the 5th aeration of the year 3 weeks ago. Most of them have been small tine. They have also verticut 3 times I think.

 

The greens never fully recover or at most for very short periods of time. They also don’t appear to roll the greens, but I can't say for sure on that. I expect at least one more aeration (big tines) before December, but we`ll see.

At our club in north Texas, we joke that every time the greens get nice, they punch them. And it’s basically true. I don’t know if it’s five times but it’s at least four.  

Edited October 13, 2024 by ChaosTheory

[mshills]

I thought our greens were scary in July for our invitational. 
 

I also thought we were going to aerate them last week. 
 

Then I played yesterday. 😳😳😳 If they were aerated I could not tell. They are like bowling alleys now that the weather is cooler. My putting stats reflected the greens condition. Holy crap. 

[mallrat]

23 hours ago, ThinkingPlus said:

I have never seen any green maintenance practice result in smoother greens after a few days. The best I have ever seen is reasonably playable after a couple of weeks. Usually the greens are as good as they can be the day before aeration, verticutting, etc... . 

Sorry, that sucks. 
 

I’m a firm believer that the 1st 2 or 3 days after a top dress the greens should be as good as it gets. 

 

 

[ThinkingPlus]

1 hour ago, mallrat said:

Sorry, that sucks. 
 

I’m a firm believer that the 1st 2 or 3 days after a top dress the greens should be as good as it gets. 

 

 

Everybody keeps saying that and I don't understand why. Top dressing dumps a bunch of sand on the greens. Putting on that is like putting on little marbles at best or mushing through soft sand at worst. In the early morning, wet balls end up looking like cinnamon donut holes. Spend lots of time cleaning the ball and putter face. Until all the sand migrates off the green somehow, it's a bumpy, sandy mess.

[NorthTexasGlfr]

1 hour ago, mallrat said:

Sorry, that sucks. 
 

I’m a firm believer that the 1st 2 or 3 days after a top dress the greens should be as good as it gets. 

 

 

Can you or @TexasTurf tell us what we are missing?

 

I've never ever experienced that. Like @ThinkingPlus says, it's always been weeks before the greens putt well and they've always putted the best the last few weeks or few days before aeration. 

[mshills]

2 hours ago, mallrat said:

Sorry, that sucks. 
 

I’m a firm believer that the 1st 2 or 3 days after a top dress the greens should be as good as it gets. 

 

 

After top dress, 2 or 3 days? Where?

 

I must be missing something….but I’d love to learn something in this thread here again. 

Edited October 13, 2024 by mshills

[mallrat]

First the sand doesn’t migrate any where but down (ideally). So the sand will even out uneven spots in the turf, basically fill in any ridges or little indentions in the turf. When the sand gets drug in it basically breaks up the thatch; thatch leads to uneven surfaces and soft spongy like conditions. When the sand works its way in, it breaks up the thatch and/or horizontal growth, think of it in terms of your fingers interlaced. The sand stands the grass up so it now stands more vertical which allows a cleaner mow. When more grass is standing up and mowed at the same height you will get a smoother surface. 
 

It sounds like when your courses are top dressing they are going too heavy with sand, not dragging it in well enough or watering it in properly. The line of sand doesn’t appear when the sand is dry. 

[TexasTurf]

4 hours ago, NorthTexasGlfr said:

 

Can you or @TexasTurf tell us what we are missing?

 

I've never ever experienced that. Like @ThinkingPlus says, it's always been weeks before the greens putt well and they've always putted the best the last few weeks or few days before aeration. 

Because of expectations. We are the home to the top players in the world and the biggest movers and shakers in north Texas. So you figure out how to do it to meet those expectations.

 

After aerification it will take a week or so to get back to perfect. But for verticutting and topdressing it should be noticeably better the next day.

 

Through experience we have learned how to do these things without negatively influencing playability. 

[mallrat]

40 minutes ago, TexasTurf said:

Because of expectations. We are the home to the top players in the world and the biggest movers and shakers in north Texas. So you figure out how to do it to meet those expectations.

 

After aerification it will take a week or so to get back to perfect. But for verticutting and topdressing it should be noticeably better the next day.

 

Through experience we have learned how to do these things without negatively influencing playability. 

 

How long do you see your verticut lines after verticutting? At my previous course you could see the lines for a couple days, though they impacted play in any way. At my current course you can barely see them at the end of the day and I don’t think we are being aggressive enough but not my call. 

[TexasTurf]

23 hours ago, mallrat said:

 

How long do you see your verticut lines after verticutting? At my previous course you could see the lines for a couple days, though they impacted play in any way. At my current course you can barely see them at the end of the day and I don’t think we are being aggressive enough but not my call. 

Great question.

 

We have bermuda practice greens and bent practice greens, and bent on the course.

 

Like you said, we go very light on the bent where you can barely see it, and go very light on the topdressing with push spreaders, and work it in with manual brushes, that are pushed by hand, so we don't drive on those greens and you can hardly tell anything has been done.

 

For the bermuda it is much more aggressive, but not overly so, and more sand, then brush it in with a tow behind bush on a cart, because it performs better with more aggressive inputs.

[TexasTurf]

On 10/13/2024 at 5:21 PM, ThinkingPlus said:

Everybody keeps saying that and I don't understand why. Top dressing dumps a bunch of sand on the greens. Putting on that is like putting on little marbles at best or mushing through soft sand at worst. In the early morning, wet balls end up looking like cinnamon donut holes. Spend lots of time cleaning the ball and putter face. Until all the sand migrates off the green somehow, it's a bumpy, sandy mess.

That is due to three main things. First, too much sand. Second, not working the sand into the greens profile enough with brushing and watering. And third, but most important even if you are doing the first two, using a type of sand that is hurting rather than helping. Sand selection is very important.

[ThinkingPlus]

7 hours ago, TexasTurf said:

That is due to three main things. First, too much sand. Second, not working the sand into the greens profile enough with brushing and watering. And third, but most important even if you are doing the first two, using a type of sand that is hurting rather than helping. Sand selection is very important.

I guess I have never played regularly anywhere that did green maintenance the right way. I would also be very surprised if the locals are using the right sand. Unless the local CC orders sand for bunkers from SA, then no one gets golf specific sand down here. My understanding is that several courses will pitch in so they can share a railroad car full of the golf specific stuff.

[kaschreiber]

A buddy and I were having a discussion after seeing recent pics of Gamble Sand's second course (Scarecrow? Don't personally love the name. Anyway-) and the bunkers looked to be all grassed in. He was saying that they may just be trying to grow up grass, kill it down to have the base of the bunker be a layer of thatch, then bring in sand. I was under the impression a bunker would almost certainly need some type of synthetic liner - thatch itself wouldn't suffice and you'd be dumping more sand in every year. In your experience, have you seen bunkers constructed with solely a layer of thatch on the bottom? He claims this is Doak's preferred method, I can find nothing to that effect. Thanks!

[Holy Moses]

The grubs and the skunks, raccoons, and cranes that have been eating them have been terrible in Chicago this fall. How many of your supers applied acelepryn or imidacloprid to the roughs in addition to your greens, tees, and fairways?

[caniac6]

1 hour ago, kaschreiber said:

A buddy and I were having a discussion after seeing recent pics of Gamble Sand's second course (Scarecrow? Don't personally love the name. Anyway-) and the bunkers looked to be all grassed in. He was saying that they may just be trying to grow up grass, kill it down to have the base of the bunker be a layer of thatch, then bring in sand. I was under the impression a bunker would almost certainly need some type of synthetic liner - thatch itself wouldn't suffice and you'd be dumping more sand in every year. In your experience, have you seen bunkers constructed with solely a layer of thatch on the bottom? He claims this is Doak's preferred method, I can find nothing to that effect. Thanks!

I have seen sod laid over the drains, and sprayed with round up prior to sanding the bunker , but not grassing the entire bottom of the bunker . Doak sure seems to know what he’s doing.

[kaschreiber]

42 minutes ago, caniac6 said:

I have seen sod laid over the drains, and sprayed with round up prior to sanding the bunker , but not grassing the entire bottom of the bunker . Doak sure seems to know what he’s doing.

In that case you would still have some kind of liner at the bottom of the bunker though, correct? Or you're saying you've seen it where there is no liner at the bottom of a bunker and it's stricly sod / thatch? 

[Holy Moses]

4 hours ago, kaschreiber said:

A buddy and I were having a discussion after seeing recent pics of Gamble Sand's second course (Scarecrow? Don't personally love the name. Anyway-) and the bunkers looked to be all grassed in. He was saying that they may just be trying to grow up grass, kill it down to have the base of the bunker be a layer of thatch, then bring in sand. I was under the impression a bunker would almost certainly need some type of synthetic liner - thatch itself wouldn't suffice and you'd be dumping more sand in every year. In your experience, have you seen bunkers constructed with solely a layer of thatch on the bottom? He claims this is Doak's preferred method, I can find nothing to that effect. Thanks!

Are you talking about Billy Bunkers? Those are becoming very popular and they use no liners. They use gravel-polymer-sand.

https://www.billybunker.com/copy-of-better-billy-bunker-1

 

[caniac6]

3 hours ago, kaschreiber said:

In that case you would still have some kind of liner at the bottom of the bunker though, correct? Or you're saying you've seen it where there is no liner at the bottom of a bunker and it's stricly sod / thatch? 

No liner.

[Dancin]

Doak has mentioned this a couple times. He generally thinks the billy bunker et all systems are a huge waste of money in most cases and unnecessary.

[TexasTurf]

Too many posts to quote just one. But just the sod as a liner is a real thing. I don't like it in warm season grasses because they will just find a way to grow up through it.

 

I also cannot recommend the better billy bunker. We tried that out on our bunkers on several holes installed by one of the best companies in the business to specs, and it failed within 2 years. Just turned into loose gravel. If you want to go the hard bunker liner route go with the concrete, but that has it's own problems, mainly holding too much water and hard to fix or renovate.

 

Synthetic / rubber and plastic liner in my opinion is best. It can move around a bit in big rain events, but at least you can fix it in house, and drains very well. 

Edited October 20, 2024 by TexasTurf

[TexasTurf]

On 10/19/2024 at 3:02 PM, Holy Moses said:

The grubs and the skunks, raccoons, and cranes that have been eating them have been terrible in Chicago this fall. How many of your supers applied acelepryn or imidacloprid to the roughs in addition to your greens, tees, and fairways?

If you have the budget it is an absolute must. Like you said the damage isn't from the grubs themselves, it is from what is digging to eat them. Acelepryn will kill them for sure at the labeled rate, but you have to water it in heavy and deep enough to get it to them, otherwise you're wasting $$$. They thrive a few inches deep below the grass.

 

A bunch of guys around here also opt for the .22 method to take the pests out, but insecticide definitely works better if you can afford it.

[Archimedes65]

Our club has consistently had amazing conditions, and we’ve historically only done one maintenance a year, a massive week long effort in early November each year, which is coming up in a couple of weeks.  Yet yesterday, our normally excellent bent grass greens were the best that I’ve ever seen them.  Perfect, fast, and rolling really true, and they haven’t been punched in a year.  I honestly don’t know how the super does it.  They have indicated that increased play (35k rounds) is going to cause them to increase maintenance next year, so my guess is we’ll soon have two a year.

 

 

[mshills]

Same. We don’t have a large budget at all, and our super does an incredible, almost unbelievable job. 
 

Greens were punched and top dressed last week. They rolled pretty well yesterday. A little sandy, and some sand build up on a couple greens and most collars. Ball picked up a bit of sand while rolling but totally playable. 

[mallrat]

Not sure what grubs you are talking about but we spray wall to wall (everything) for billbug, they have become a real problem the last 4 years in the PNW. They particularly like bunker slopes and south facing slopes. We also spray 1x a year for cutworm and 1x a year for crane fly. 
 

We rebuilt a couple bunkers on our own before doing a course renovation.  We bought perennial rye sod and turned it upside down and seems to be working well as a liner. 

 

[596]

Our rounds were down this year. We only saw 73,000.  And that's down from 2 years ago at over 80,000. 

 

We punch 3x a year during growing season, basically June, July and August.  With some adjustment for weather.  

 

Takes just over a week to heal.  

[sabram]

On 10/19/2024 at 2:32 PM, kaschreiber said:

A buddy and I were having a discussion after seeing recent pics of Gamble Sand's second course (Scarecrow? Don't personally love the name. Anyway-) and the bunkers looked to be all grassed in. He was saying that they may just be trying to grow up grass, kill it down to have the base of the bunker be a layer of thatch, then bring in sand. I was under the impression a bunker would almost certainly need some type of synthetic liner - thatch itself wouldn't suffice and you'd be dumping more sand in every year. In your experience, have you seen bunkers constructed with solely a layer of thatch on the bottom? He claims this is Doak's preferred method, I can find nothing to that effect. Thanks!

No Liner. Here's a link to a discussion on this subject from Golf Club Atlas. Tom Doak did post a reply saying this is being done at Pacific Dunes

 

GCA sod bunker liner discussion

[TexasTurf]

 

[NorthTexasGlfr]

9 hours ago, TexasTurf said:

 

 

What is Mark Ross trying to tell us exactly?

[caniac6]

31 minutes ago, NorthTexasGlfr said:

 

What is Mark Ross trying to tell us exactly?

Where is this. A lot of courses don’t aerify fairways, but I have a hard time believing the no irrigation part.

[Holy Moses]

42 minutes ago, caniac6 said:

Where is this. A lot of courses don’t aerify fairways, but I have a hard time believing the no irrigation part.

I would like to see what they look like during a summer drought