Today, the back nine greens will be sodded with A1 bentgrass. Hopefully, we will complete the work today in order to beat the heat and be able to take advantage of forecasted rain on Wednesday and Thursday.
The front nine greens were mowed on Monday without too much scalping. Crew will be plugging small spots on the #3, 6, 7, 9 and then #5 all day. I plan to open theses five greens on the front nine this weekend. Prior to opening on Saturday, I still need to lightly topdress these greens and bring the mowing height down a little each day. I'll identify which back nine greens I plan to open after we finish the sod work.
The following two paragraphs are a summary of diagnostic tests performed on soil cores recently taken from 4 greens. The work was done by Norm Hummel of Hummer & Co., a turfgrass soil consulting and soil testing firm in New York.
The analysis of the root zone mix reveals that the sand mix meets USGA specifications and the greensmix is capable of supporting a healthy turf. The variability of the sand depth creates some watering issues that challenge the success of the turf but it might be overcome with other maintenance measures. A thin layer is or has developed in the interface area just above the gravel layer. At present, the greens drain.
Up to this point, the top three to four inches of the green is where I focus most of my management practices. According to plant pathology tests and soil tests from two different labs, the management practices implemented by me have resulted in a growing environment conducive to growing healthy turf. One of the toughest parts of my job is formulating a maintenance strategy that meets play expectations yet still allows for adjustments when Mother Nature delivers a difficult weather scenario as we have experienced this summer.
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