Monday Work--Spotification

I was planning on posting this last week, as the final installment of our November 5th work schedule, but better late than never.  I was just asked yesterday if Mondays were our off day or relaxed day when we get a break from course preparation.  The opposite is true with Mondays being the most productive day of the week.

To summarize the efforts of that day, we accomplished the following:

• Re-shaped two troublesome bunkers
• Installed a drain in a cartpath and over 100 feet of drain pipe connecting to a lake
• Verticut all the greens and the chipping green twice
• Applied 6-8 inches of mulch to over 10,000 of non-irrgated space
• Mowed all the fairways
• Mowed all tees and approaches
• Mowed the range tee and filled all divots
• Sprayed tree maintenance rings with roundup and a pre-emergent on 4 holes

And, as the last entry, we continued to spot aerify thin locations in the rough and green surrounds.  This is the third week of this practice.  The main areas we are working on are near the fairway bunkers and landing areas.  

The above photo is next to the 15th green.  This particular location is thick with thatch that keeps water from getting into the soil and therefore, the root zone.  Nightly irrigation does little to keep the turf going and hand watering runs off the intended target. This aerfication will pull some plugs out of the thatch mat and allow access to the soil below.  

The photo to the left is the rough right of the 11th fairway, adjacent to the approach.  This area was destroyed by grubs and the crows, raccoons, possums, and whatever else was trying to eat them.  Rafael spent all day aerifying, seeding, and dragging in the plugs to improve these locations, and many more.  Since then, we've been spot watering daily to keep the seed moist and encourage germination.  

This is just one step in the road to recover and we will keep repeating the process to improve the soil structure and turf density.  

Only a few more days till our next Monday!!!

Monday Work--Greens Verticut

 As I continue to describe our activities last Monday, this post is a look at verticutting the greens.

Thatch control is extremely important to the health and playability of the greens.  A little bit of thatch is desirable for traffic tolerance, but too much can be a nightmare.  Puffy greens, soft surfaces, disease pressure, and hydrophobic spots are all related to thatch.

Recently, we completed the main component of thatch management with an aerfication of the greens.  Just one month later, we are back at it with a shallow verticut to smooth the surface and promote upright growth or reduce the grain.

It’s pretty amazing how much material comes out of green during a veritcut.  The vertical  blades which resemble blades on a table saw, cut a slit in the green and toss the organic material into the buckets on our mower.  A few months ago we had to dump the buckets every other pass on the greens.  This time we only had to empty twice per green.  

The depth for this time was set at 1/8 inch below the surface of the green.  This just barely meets the soil surface and does most of the the work in the thatch layer.  Deeper verticuts could be used on the chipping green and small putting green which are very spongy.  

The result of this practice is an improvement in surface smoothness and an increase in green speed.  We often follow a verticut with a light topdressing, but skipped that process this time since we just aerified and can wait a bit before adding some sand.  

I still have one more post to share that will cover the final portion of our work this past Monday; one day of work and a week's worth of information for the blog.

Monday work--Lots o Mulch

To continue the rundown of Monday's busy schedule, this installment is all about turf reduction.  There are many out-of-play locations at Bernardo Heights CC that have always been turf.  Since turf is expensive to maintain and irrigate, we are trying to reduce some turf that is not necessary.

Mulch is extremely easy to come by as tree companies want to avoid costly disposal expenses.  We have a deal with a local outfit and receive frequent deliveries of chipping debris.  The material is a mix of leaves, pine needles, and wood chips and is naturally dark brown.  We broadcast the mulch at a depth of 6 inches which performs excellent to keep out weeds and grasses.

Our recent efforts include a wooded area between the first tee and the driving range and two large perimeter areas next to the 6th and 7th tees (pictured left and below).  So far, we've only chosen areas that are well off the beaten path.  If your ball happens to enter the mulch, take your medicine and play it as it lies.  That is your penalty for a very poor shot.

We will continue to identify other areas that do not require turf and may look better with some mulch, pine straw, ground cover, decomposed granite, or native grasses.  There are many more choices than 2 inch grass and multiple textures and colors will add to the beauty of the golf course.

Monday Work--Drain for Safety

A few weeks ago, we were notified of a potential safety hazard next to a forward tee on the 13th hole.  The cart path has a low spot and water collects against the curb.  Algae is quick to grow on the concrete and the surface becomes extremely slick with or without golf shoes.  Our first response was to broom and clean the area, but the algae grew back within a few days.  As a temporary solution we placed a rubber mat on the low spot to offer a bit more traction until we could schedule drain installation.

We are blessed with a few tools that other courses do not have, like a concrete saw.  I've only been on staff for a little over four months and we've used this saw a half dozen times.  Santiago, our Equipment Technician and jack of all trades, handles most of the concrete work and then turns the rest over to Camacho, our Irrigation Tech.  

All together, seven people worked on this project, but only Camacho was there from start to finish.  Satiago was in the shop most the day repairing a mower, sharpening another, and setting up the triplex to verticut greens (Thursday's post).  Oso, the guy running the trencher, and Fidel were both on bunker duty which was highlighted in yesterday's post.  Rosendo and Ricardo were assigned to help Camacho back-fill the trench and then returned to some mulch work (tomorrow's post) and also were sent to pick up some downed branches.

The crew is getting used to being pushed and pulled in different directions throughout the day and do so with little down time.  I hope it keeps the day interesting, instead of confusing, but either way the productivity has been excellent.

More to come tomorrow.  Thanks for reading.

Monday Work--Bunker Duty

Each Monday, Bernardo Heights CC is closed to play and the maintenance staff is freed up to concentrate on projects and disruptive cultural practices.  Put another way, we can tear things up and not worry about play.  I enjoy the membership and want to see the course packed on every other day, but there's nothing like a closed Monday.  We accomplish a week's worth of work in one day and supply this blog with a week's worth of posts.  The next five days I will highlight the efforts of the crew on Monday, November 5th.

One of our many tasks at hand on this Monday was the re-shaping of a couple of bunkers that had become rather unplayable.  The first and worst was a bunker on #8 that sits on the right side of the fairway about 50 yards from the green.  A ball could land near the center, high on the lip, and roll back to the front edge of the bunker.  The only choice a player has is to punch out to the fairway.

The center lobe, part of a design that must have been a staple in Ted Robinson courses, has encroached over ten feet into the bunker.  When you have this much bunker to reclaim, digging with a shovel is going to take awhile.  We do not have a back hoe, so we tried the front end loader and saved a bunch of time.

(I have a video of the work with the tractor, but after three attempts, it's not working out.)

Under the grass we removed was ample sand to be returned to play.  We used a rototiller to fluff it up and raked it thoroughly to remove any grass parts that were left over.  We also attended to a fairway bunker on #5 and will look at a fairway bunker on #13 in the near future.  

The Nozzle Dance

Nozzles being setup in the shop

I've seen this at most the courses I've worked at.  The staff does its best to improve the uniformity of the irrigation system by switching out nozzles in the sprinkler heads.  The original combination is not as effective as desired, so another set of nozzles is used, and another, and another.  Pretty soon, nozzles that don't match up or from different manufacturers are paired together.  It becomes a free for all because no set of nozzles really works all that well.

An irrigation system should put out water as efficiently as rain, right?  Each sprinkler head costs around $150 and a modern irrigation system could push towards $2 million.  So that kind of investment must translate to perfect applications of water, so you'd think.  The reality is, even the best irrigation system is only batting 85% efficiency and that is very rare.

There are many ways we can improve the distribution efficiency of our irrigation system and we'll start with the most simple and rapid improvement.  We've already determined the most effective nozzles for our sprinkler heads, our pressure, and our spacing.  We've also determined the second most effective nozzles so we can use what we have on hand.

Here is a good before/after example of a nozzle change.  This is taken about 50 yards into the fairway on #15.  The photo on the right is not perfect, but a huge improvement and perhaps the variation in color and density will disappear over time.  This was taken only 2 weeks apart in late September.

So this is the start, but there is much more to do.  This winter we will begin the task of raising many, many sprinkler heads which have sunk below the surface of the fairway.  We need all the heads to have the proper nozzles, the proper angel (flat), and the correct height.  We are also trimming, not removing, trees that block irrigation and aerifying many locations to improve water infiltration.  Plenty to do, and hopefully, plenty of success to show from our efforts.

Plowing fairways

Aerification is often explained in terms of agricultural crops which are plowed between seasons. This brings essential nutrients up to the surface, tills in organic material, and loosens the soil to improve seeding, rooting, and drainage.  Obviously, greens cannot be plowed at any time, so aerification is the substitute.

Last week, we used our rototiller in some bare spots in the fairways, essentially plowing the surface.  This looks like an aggressive approach, but it is the fastest way to improve a perennial bare spot to good, playable turf.  The rototiller breaks up the dead thatch mat thats covers the surface and mixes the organic matter throughout a six inch deep seeding bed.  We mix in some ryegrass seed and six days later we have some seedlings popping up.

The locations we targeted for this work are mainly at the edge of fairways below the canopy of adjacent trees.  The bermuda population is low and always will be, so ryegrass is a decent substitute.  To give the new turf the best chance to survive, we rototill the soil, trim tree branches that block irrigation, and amend the soil with proper fertility.

You may notice some white flags lining these areas to encourage cart traffic to avoid the new seeds.  The flags are highly visible and save us time and money compared to using rope and stakes.  All the rototilled areas are marked ground under repair, so please take a free drop while the new surface matures.