A Slow Start to the Season

The Winter Season has taken its toll on the golf course in many ways. Obviously the most severe was the damage to the greens. The extended long winter season has not allowed the golf course to respond like it currently does in early April. The soil temperatures are about 2 to 3 weeks behind where they should be. The result of that has been a golf course that is extremely slow to green up. The snow fall that stuck around until late March didn't not allow us to get on the golf course and begin our clean-up process. The process actually started on April 4th. Many of you that played this weekend may have noticed that projects that took place during the Winter months were not cleaned up. Currently, we are in the process of addressing these areas. We have a plan in place to present you the golf course you have been accustomed to. We are diligently working to help the greens recover from the damage. We will keep them closed as long as we can to help speed up this process. Green and black sand have been applied to the damaged areas to help increase soil temperatures. And we will continue to apply and remove covers daily to keep the cold temperatures from delaying the recovery process. We will also be watering these areas frequently to encourage seed germination and allow damage turf a chance to recover. The Winter project areas will be seeded this week. We will begin mowing our greens, tees, and fairways throughout the week, which will encourage more growth. With a lot of hard work, and some warmer weather things should begin to turn around quickly.

A Rough Winter

The Winter was a rough one for the Old Course Greens at The Country Club of Scranton. We have sustained ice damage on seven of the greens on the Old Course. The fourteenth green, (pictured to the left) sustained the most damage. These greens have been spiked, seeded, fertilized, and heavily topdressed. The Green Department removed snow and ice on the greens several times throughout the winter to try and prevent this from occurring. We will keep these greens closed for a period of time to allow these areas to recover. We will be able to give the membership 18 holes to play for the foreseeable future. The closing of these greens will allow them to recover more quickly. The covers will remain on these greens to help increase the soil temperatures, which will result in faster recovery. We have battled ice damage in the past. The shapes and undulations on our greens allow water to sit on the surface throughout the winter. The internal drainage is not effective once the soil freezes. The covers are designed to prevent wind and cold temperature kill. Unfortunately they do not help prevent damage from ice accumulation. They will take some time to recover but we will keep the membership up to date with the progress on an ongoing basis. The Green Department is doing everything possible to aide in a quick and thorough recovery.

Spring has Sprung

The very difficult winter has taken its toll on the golf course. We have experienced some ice damage on several of our green. Holes #6, #7, #9, #10, #14, and #18 has experienced some degree of damage. It is still to early to determine the severity and how much will respond to some warmer temperatures. We have recently fertilized these greens and the covers will remain on the Old Course until we start to experience some consistent warmer temperatures. We will keep you updated with the recovery process and let you know when the Old Course will open. We began removing the snow from the greens in early February to try and remove the ice. Keep in mind that the covers do not prevent ice damage. The covers are actually permeable. They allow water and air to pass through. Covers are used to protect the greens from extreme wind and extreme cold termperatures which we are so prone to.

Insect Repellent

The attached photos shows the damage that bug spray can cause to the turf. Please remember when applying bug spray please stand on the cart path or the rough.

Rough Renovation

Today we implemented our rough renovation program that will take place this Fall on the Old Course. Our goal for this program is to provide a more consistent rough that consists of desirable turfgrass species. Our rough consists of several different grasses. Unfortunately two of these grass are bentgrass and Poa Annua. Bentgrass does not perfom well at high heights of cut. Poa Annua does not tolerate the heat and drier conditions. The Poa Annua has especially struggled during the heat and drought conditions that we have experienced this summer. We are currently overseeding our roughs with Perennial Ryegrass. We will be aerifying and slicing seed into the rough around the fairways and greens. We are going to concentrate around the greens and fairways this Fall. While seed is establishing we will have most of these area roped- off to prohibit cart traffic from damaging the seed. This will also help us keep the Ryegrass Seed from tracking into the fairways and contaminating the bent/poa fairways. We realize that this process may cause a minor inconvenience and may be a little unsightly but will make a huge impact on the quality of our golf course.

Greens Are Recovering

The putting surfaces have recovered from the aggressive aerificaiton that took place a few weeks ago. Green Speeds are pretty much back to normal. Other areas of the golf course have recovered nicely from the Summer Maintenance. At this point we have set ourselves up for a great Fall golf season with very minimal interruption. The temperatures are starting to lower which should help alleviate the stress the the golf course was under. We will begin spraying the weeds in the high grass areas again next week. You will notice some significant yellowing in these areas as the weeks begin to die. This will allow the fescue to flourish and provide better aesthetics and playability for next season.

Post Aerification Mowing

The Aerification and Topdressing process takes its toll on the golf course as well as our mowing equipment. We attempted to mow greens this morning for the second time since the aerificaiton was completed. We were able to get a pretty good cut on our first few greens but after the sand had time to take its toll on the mowers they struggled to cut any grass. They will continue to get better as the holes begin to fill and the sand has a chance to get worked into the canopy. On days that we don't mow we will be rolling the greens to help with smoothness. We realize that this process may be frustrating for those of you trying to play but it should begin to get better quickly. I have always looked at aerification as a temporary inconvenience for a permanent improvement.