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Feherty on the PGA and course setup.

Here is a pretty good video on the PGA Championship and the course setup.

And You Thought 2010 Was a Tough Year!!!

By David A. Oatis, director, Northeast Region
August 18, 2011

Bentgrass thriving in a sea of dying Poa annua.

Depending on your location, your golf course may have experienced winter injury, torrential spring rains, a few weeks of mild weather, and then record-breaking July heat interspersed with a few more heavy rain events. Even August hasn’t been easy.  And let’s not forget the two to three generations of annual bluegrass weevils that have chewed their way through annual bluegrass populations and a little bentgrass at many courses this year.  Not surprisingly, plenty of golf courses have experienced problems as a result of the extreme weather conditions. 
Diagnostic laboratories have been overrun with disease samples, and outbreaks of summer patch and anthracnose both have been very common.  ‘Abiotic stress’ has been a common diagnosis, and in plenty of cases, annual bluegrass has just run out of gas.  As is usually the case this time of year, annual bluegrass is the species that is failing most often.  This is a good year to have more bentgrass!
Despite all of this, there are plenty of success stories.  Courses that installed drainage clearly are seeing the benefits this year.  The same goes for courses that improved their grass growing environments by tree removal and the installation of electric fans.  Some courses that have had good results with fans now are looking to install more or larger fans because of their obvious benefit.  Courses that implemented aggressive cultivation and soil modification programs on their greens also have benefited. 
With the renovation window upon us, a word of caution is appropriate.  Now is a terrific time to aerate and get seed into the ground in damaged areas, but do so with at least one eye on the weather.  Aerators can kick off more disease activity, and we are at great risk for damage from those high-sky, low-humidity days where turfgrass plants lose water through their leaves far faster than they can extract it from the soil with their weakened root systems.  We have already had a couple of those days, and we have the potential for more.  Just because it rained yesterday or last night does not mean that turf cannot wilt this afternoon.  Keep scouting for weevils, and beware of late August summer patch infections that might catch you unaware. 

August Report to the Board

Green Report

August 2011

The golf course has made it through the most difficult part of summer in good shape. I’ll highlight a few key areas.

Greens – While not perfect in appearance, they have performed well this season. I have been able to maintain speeds in the 9.5’ range and faster when the weather cooperates.  Our rooting is better than it was last month and I hope to get them to root deeper into the fall. With the shallower roots, the greens were watered a little more frequently this summer and thus were a bit softer than I would have liked. We have topdressed the remaining scars from winter on a regular basis. These will fill in more after aerification.

Tees – I mowed tees slightly lower this season than in past. The tees are in good shape considering a large amount of play over the last month. The 15^th and 16^th tees are two of the worst, some minor tree removal would help and also enlarging both tees would also help, especially the 15^th as an iron tee.

Fairways – The fairways have been good and have held their color most of the season. Not bad considering only one fertilizer application to date. We have had more dollar spot than normal this year and we have already treated them four times with most likely one more application to go before our first frost. Wet areas and the slopes on 8 are the only areas I have trouble with. Drainage and wetting agents would help in these situations. Our weed populations are relatively low, with only some minor crabgrass breakthrough. I usually take note of this and treat these areas next spring. It’s a good economical way for us to treat crabgrass without spraying the whole place every year.

Irrigation – Our system has run well since we had some pump work done. We did have a cracked foot valve earlier in the summer, but otherwise it has been reliable.

Equipment – This has probably been one of our most troublesome areas of operation. We have been working hard to keep things running at a minimum cost. But I can see where we are spending more and more on repairs. Not to mention that most of our mowers are significantly becoming outdated. There is much better technology out there that would help us make our course better. Our oldest fairway mower (1994) is currently out of service due to a bad injector pump or possibly even a blown motor. The injector pump is $2,000. I’m not sure if this is worth fixing at this point. If the motor is blown, then it’s definitely heading for the junk pile. I’m afraid this will be the norm for us rather then the exception going forward unless we begin to invest back into the course.

Staff – My staff has been good this year, reliable at least. I have one kid that decided not to go back to school that I would like to keep through the fall, but it is non-budgeted.

Aerification – Greens ¼” tines right after Labor Day. Tees hopefully right after the Jug. Fairways if time allows in September and October.

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Tuesday morning and the course is very wet, with more rain expected. Hopefully we get some nice weather soon so the course can dry out and speed up. The greens right now are soft and slow despite a double cut and roll. Hopefully things pick up later in the week with some sunshine.
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Welcome to the start of what looks like a fairly wet week for the Little Brown Jug. We are out early this morning mowing everything we can that doesn't have puddles on it. Hopefully we dry out enough by Wednesday or Thursday to get a decent dry cut on everything. This doesn't look like a great week for getting the greens super firm and fast, but we will do everything we can.
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Two greens at the Atlanta Athletic Club suffered "minor damage" Wednesday evening, but the damage was fully repaired and play should not be affected.

By The PGA of America

JOHNS CREEK, Ga. – Two greens at the Atlanta Athletic Club suffered “minor damage” by mowers Wednesday evening, PGA Championship officials have announced. They stressed, however, that the damage was fully repaired and that the incident would not affect play, which is set to begin early Thursday.

“During this evening's golf course greens maintenance at the Atlanta Athletic Club, there was minor damage caused to the edges of both the 14th and 17th greens,” officials said in a statement. “This damage is believed to be the result of a significant rise in the dew point at approximately 7:00 p.m., which caused the brushes on the mowers on those greens to stick in the grass and damage the turf.

“The damage has already been fully repaired by the grounds staff at the Atlanta Athletic Club, led by Ken Mangum, the Director of Golf Courses and Grounds,” the statement explained. “This will not affect the opening round of the 93rd PGA Championship and we look forward to play in the first round tomorrow in the season's final major, beginning at 7:30 a.m. ET.”

LBJ Prep

We are on the cusp of one of our biggest events of the season, the 40th annual Little Brown Jug. This will be my 18th LBJ prep. I still get pretty excited for this event. I think the perception is that we change what we typically do for this tournament versus our regular maintenance. To some extent this is true, but for the most part we keep it the same. A few changes are that we mow fairways, tees etc. everyday of the event, versus just three times a week during regular play. Fertility and fungicide applications are all timed to peak around this event. Hopefully this works out, but sometimes scheduling and weather have more to say about this timing than I do. We make sure our trim work is good and our bunker work is as good as it can be with the limits of our staff size. We also try and fill as many divots as we can both in the fairways and tees. Most of this is not a change from our regular routine.
Green speed is probably the one area where things change a little. I have mentioned many times that we try for a regular green speed of 9.5' or 10 for regular play. Probably closer to 9.5' most days and usually 10' for tournaments. For the LBJ I like to get them a little further north of 10'. In order to get there, we groom a little more often leading up to the event. We also try and maintain a double cut with more frequent rollings. We also begin mowing greens at night, so in actuality they are mowed 3 times a day versus our regular once per day. This gives us that extra half foot to foot of speed we are looking for. Weather also plays a big factor also, too much rain or humidity and our speeds drop. Also if its significantly hot, I wont push the greens as much due to the added stress. Hopefully by mid August we can get a few 70 degree days with cool nights.

Course setup is another tricky practice. We have such a wide range of players in this event that we want to make it challenging for the best players, yet keep it enjoyable for everyone else. That's not always easy to do, but it is certainly in our minds as we try and show off our course.