Finally! A day where everything went as planned! The sunny dry weather made for perfect conditions to complete all the clean-up. The greens topdressing went very well also, with all the greens being completed by early afternoon.
Rolling the greens after topdressing
A change for this years aeration is to add a deep aeration on greens. Considering they are nearly ten years old, they are performing very well. Our last physical soil tests reported that they are maturing better than expected and that organic matter (OM) in being kept in check. The top few inches is where the bulk of the roots reside and where the mat (thatch and topdressing mix) is. This layer is the slowest draining in any green due to the higher OM content blocking pore spaces. Regular hollow core aeration machines are capable of aerating to approx three inches. In order to break through this layer and go deeper a vertidrain type machine is needed. This helps break through the top layer and provides air and water channels to encourage deeper rooting.
The Wiedenmann on greens aerating to eight inches
Up until now the regular depths have been sufficient but deep aerating now, will preempt future issues by keep the mat layer in flux. It is essential to ensure the channels are filled with sand; if not, the roots will fill the channel, potentially creating a big OM problem through the entire profile. The best way to ensure the channels are filled is to use dry sand and big holes, so it can flow down them. Based on a trial run this spring I found that aerating and topdressing the greens as normal and then following that with the deep tine worked best. We started late this afternoon to make sure all our settings were correct. The three greens that were done looked great and the remainder will be finished tomorrow.
The fairways needed to be verticut which we started today also. Verticutting stands the plants up and removes excess organic material (thatch). It also is a nice way to finish cleaning up after aerating as it helps loosen up any compacted cores or clumps of soil. Once the fairways are verticut, we blow and collect the debris. The fairways are then mowed with the groomers turned on. The groomers are basically small verticutters that sit in front of the reel and stand the grass up for a better cut. The turf on the finished fairways looks great as it is now standing as opposed to laying over; removing the grain that has occurred from mowing the same direction. The fairways are striped as this is done. The direction changes by striping enhances the benefits of removing the grain. We will return to the half-and-half cut in a week or so as it is substantially faster which saves time and money.
Checking and setting the depth of the verticutter on fairways
7 fairway verticut and ready for sweeping
So after a rocky start, we are finishing strong. The plan is to have 1-8 and 14 open by noon tomorrow. The other holes will open as we finish them. The final clean-up of piles etc around the course shouldn't take too long tomorrow. All that will remain is to topdress tees. Due to the weather delays we will aerate the Driving Range next Tuesday when we are closed.
Almost back to normal
