Watering--really?

They say that a picture is worth 1,000 words.  However, sometimes a few words may be needed to help put a picture into context.  For example, if you saw a crew member watering a fairway on Sunday morning, you might question why this was taking place.

Let's look at what is actually happening here and some reasons behind it:

• First of all, this is a hose being used--not sprinklers.  This allows for targeting selected areas.  
• Hand watering is labor-intensive, but purposefully used in order to have minimal impact on playing conditions.
• The topography of #8 obviously doesn't lead to soil conditions drying down evenly.  The Sun, wind and traffic on the slopes all affect moisture loss.  
• This is the most heavily divoted fairway on the golf course.  Allowing it to dry out can seriously inhibit divot recovery.
• In all areas of the golf course, we practice deficit irrigation.  That is, we only apply a fraction of the moisture lost each day.  The graph below illustrates how fairways were allowed to dry during the past week. 

Why might you see us running sprinklers when you wouldn't think any irrigation was needed?  We typically make a wash-in plant protectant spray monthly which needs to be watered in immediately.  We also may run heads (for six minutes) following a topdressing application to knock the sand off the upper leaf blades and down into the turf canopy.  

Interestingly, a longtime member and resident commented just last week that #8 fairway was in the best condition they had ever seen.

To mow or not to mow...

 ...that is the question.  Given all of the recent rainfall, it is often challenging to determine whether it is better to try and mow the course as scheduled, or to hold off and wait for dryer conditions.

While mowing soaked turf is definitely less than ideal, we also have to consider the "1/3 rule" in turf management, which says that you never want to remove more than one third of the leaf with a single mowing.  So if you decide to delay mowing, the options may be to either break the rule and risk scalping the turf, or raise the height of cut to stay within the one third guidelines.

The other factor which complicates matters, is the unpredictability of summer storms.  If you skip mowing a day, believing that conditions will be better the next, but another round of storms adds additional moisture, then you may be pushing back mowing by two or three days.

Mechanical damage on soaked turf.

On the bright side, with the greens being sand-based and having internal drainage, there are few times that they get a day off from the mowers.