As I posted earlier, the excessive rainfall coupled with stretches of heat and humidity have made maintaining our typical mowing, spraying schedules extremely difficult. We've fared well on sand based areas, as better drainage allows more pore space providing oxygen and gas exchange to the roots. This helps lower the typical late summer stress to the plants. The few areas in the fairways around or leading to drain basins have been hit the hardest. The constant flow of water and clay soil saturation reduced or eliminated the pore space providing oxygen to the plant. This strike coupled with high heat was more than the plants could handle.
Even with a well draining course the amount of rainfall in the past month has been unbelievable. In a 3 1/2 week span we collected nearly 17" of water in our gauge. The breaks in between storms were accompanied with warm and humid weather offering little chance to dry out.
The weather looks to be favorable in the coming weeks especially with cooler night temps. We will begin stripping the damaged turf and replacing with new bent next week. Through the next couple months we will focus on these areas by opening holes and adding topdressing. Over time the sand blend will increase water flow and provide greater pore space, just in case mother nature decides to throw another curve ball our way in the future.


I recently received a letter from the GCSAA. Our national group of superintendents rarely sends a public service announcement unless a large area of golf courses have been effected. Please take a look at the link provided below

https://gallery.mailchimp.com/8910233497473a5fbabd4be19/files/a71c795e-d697-4fb8-a31f-f72ce05d791e/GC_Notification_July2018.pdf

You can always have too much of a good thing

You'll probably never hear me say "the rain can stop now". Usually we are begging for it to help replenish the ponds, take a break from dragging hoses, and turning off the city water bill. This year has been a year of excesses. We've received 13+" of rain in the last 2 1/2 weeks and coupled with high humidity has caused saturated soil conditions with little dry down.

After patiently(haha) waiting and getting a slight break in the rain action we were finally, safely able to catch up with fairway mowing. Mike our mechanic had to raise all the mower heights so we wouldn't take off too much at one shot. This would put undue stress on the plants in normal conditions let alone dead of summer. We had to readjust the mowers three times and are back to regular height. Wheww!

With typical seasons of weather, the golf course drains extremely well. There's been many times were 2+" of rain has fallen overnight and by 1-2:00 I have put carts back on fairways with no damage. This year has been the exception. The clay soils on the property do not allow excess water to penetrate very well so miles of drain pipes and drain basins were added throughout the course. This has been a blessing for turf care and towards a play-ability standpoint. Many courses have had to close during this season due to swamp like conditions.

Even with this great design feature some damage has occurred. Last Friday we received almost 2" of rain in a short period. This, coupled with already saturated soils caused the drains to be overwhelmed creating streams and ponds to rapidly form on the fairways. This problem was compounded by the fact that immediately following the storm 90 degree blazing sun appeared. The standing water then acted like a magnifying glass rapidly increasing the temps around the plants. The second problem created is the stomates (pores) on the underside of the leaves couldn't open allowing a water vapor release which cools the plant. An analogy would be soaking in a 110 degree hot tub for the next 4 hours without coming out. Your sweat pores wouldn't open allowing you to cool down until internal temps went too far.

This past Monday and Tuesday we punched holes along these channels to help dry them out and get oxygen down to the roots. Throughout the day we will be spinning the heads 1 turn in these areas to help cool the plants without adding any significant amount of water. Once temps and humidity ratchet down a bit the plants should rebound quickly.

A very slight swale, which held water and snaked down to the basin

The contouring doing exactly what its supposed to; moving water towards a basin. Just not over and over...