Golf Course Update...

The challenge continues....We were fortunate enough to have a few great days of weather...but that has ended quite abruptly! Cold, rain and now SNOW have hindered our progress on preparing the golf course for play. During the 4 day warm stretch we were able to mow greens, roll greens, mow collars/approaches, mow fairways, open the Practice Range, rake bunkers, pressurize the irrigation system, fertilize greens, continue clean up and grind all remaining stumps from our winter tree management plan. Productivity was at a high and our staff has really put forth a great effort.

The other very important task that we have been addressing is winter injury. The extent of damage is varying. Our staff has worked continuously at plugging, seeding and repairing as much damage as we can. What we need now is mother nature to step up, warm up and provide some more sunshine to help things grow. As our members begin to play the golf course (once the snow melts) you will see the work being done to expedite the recovery process. We have utilized older damaged (greens) covers and made cut to fit covers for smaller areas of greens (to insulate the plugs and seed). This will create a greenhouse effect on the areas and help aid in recovery.

The 10th green sustained the most damage, it is sporadic, but is under repair. We feel that a temporary green should be used to eliminate traffic on these tender areas while they recover. Our hope is to have the green back in play ASAP.

Cultural Reminder:
Greens Aeration:
Sunday, May 3rd 4pm-Greens Aeration will begin.
Monday, May 4th-Greens Aeration will continue.

During this process pins will be cut into the approaches to allow the work to be completed in a timely and efficient manner. As the greens are completed they will be re-opened. As always our goal is to have all greens opened back up on Monday night.

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The Practice Range Tee

Last fall we utilized a “new to us” method of revitilization for our practice tee. Our contractor TDS, fraize mowed the surface of the tee to remove organic matter as well at to aid in leveling. The tee was then aerified and seeded to a new variety of creeping rye grass. We chose this type of turf grass as research shows rapid recovery and a low growth habit. We were able to get some great growth in the fall, but the tee is still not ready for traffic and full use. The plan is to utilize the mats until growth has filled in some of the voids etc. We will then begin to slowly set up hitting areas on the grass tee. For a while we will alternate between grass and the mats with a 50/50 ratio of use. Once the grass tee is established and is in adequate recovery mode, the practice areas will be back to normal. As always our membership’s patience is appreciated as we try to improve these areas for use.

Venting Greens...

This week we will be venting our greens with needle tines. These tines make a hole that is less than an 1/8th of inch. With our greens being completely saturated from the incredible amount of rain that we have recieved this season, there is no room for air movement in the soil. We need to create very small channels for air movement to the root zone. When roots don't have air, they die. This has not been evident yet, but with the warmer temperatures of July upon us soon, trouble could be lurking. This will be a very non-disruptive process to our members and play. We are going to vent all of our greens over then next few days early in the morning as to not disrupt play. The process is simple, we vent the green using the aerifier and needle tines, roll them smooth and then mow the green. The holes virtually dissapear and are of no effect to roll. I realize that the word aerifier starts to scare people, but this is necessary and again is very clean and non-disruptive. Check out the pic...

Spring Greens Aeration...a week later!

A week has passed since our annual spring greens aeration. We have had a mixed bag of weather, hot, dry, cold, wet and even frost! These conditions make it challenging to aid in healing, but with the more recent consistent warm temperatures we are seeing solid recovery. We were fortunate to have decent weather to complete the process on time, allowing us to fill all the holes created by the 1/2” hollow tines. As there are some minor depressions within some of the holes we will be beginning our bi-weekly topdressing program early next week. Our team is mowing and rolling our greens daily, while slowly lowering our height of cut to our summer norm. We all know that spring cultural practices are not popular among golfers, but these all important tasks are the building blocks for high performance greens conditions throughout the heart of the golf season. Check out this video produced by the USGA on Aerations effect on putting...

HIGHLAND CC GROUNDS

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