Venting

Today we vented all 19 greens.  The timing is perfect after the last two weeks of heavy rain, including four inches over the last week. By venting the greens we allow the roots to breath and promote drainage in soil that is not only heavily moistened by has been for days.

This will be a monthly occurrence and will not affect play. The tines used are intentionally small and leave little trace. Know that this is a practice done to ensure your greens stay as healthy and playable as possible.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

Bluegrass News

   

 Many of you may have noticed certain areas of the fairways lightening in color (taking on a Golden or Bronze appearance) amidst the usual green turf.  These are areas with a heavy concentration of Annual Bluegrass.  The bronzing you have noticed is due to multiple applications of a plant growth regulator called Trimmit. Our intentions are to prevent the Bluegrass from going to seed and also to help promote the growth of Bentgrass- which is our selected type of turf.

Bluegrass naturally out performs Bentgrass with it's aggressive growth habits, but higher heat tolerance, ability to withstand lower mowing heights and many other traits make Bentgrass a far superior species for golf in our region.  By weakening the invading Bluegrass, we give an advantage to the Bentgrass and encourage it to fill in for the ailing species as it looses ground. Gives new meaning to the term "Turf War" wouldn't you say? 

You'll notice that no matter what you see from the Bluegrass in our fairways there will always be healthy strong Bentgrass right there beside it, and hopefully as seasons pass overtaking it.

See you on the course!

Elliott Dowling

Eight Fairway's Uninvited Guest

The above picture was taken on the approach of number eight fairway. Some of you may notice that here is a sizable discrepancy in the growth rate of the turf there. The reason for such is simple, the taller turf is actually a different species of grass; Ryegrass to be exact. It is not unheard of for low quality crops of seed to contain foreign contaminants, even the seed of other plants. Our theory is that the Bentgrass seed used to regrow eight fairway contained some Ryegrass seed as well.  When the fairway was still establishing the immature Ryegrass plants would not make their presence known.  But now that they are strong and mature their telltale seed stalks have caught our attention.

Unlike annual bluegrass, there are no existing products meant to remove Ryegrass from stands of Bentgrass. And because of their significant height our fairway mowers cannot cut the stalks, which bend down instead of being pulled into the reel and severed. This leaves us with only one option: stripping and replacing the current sod.  However, since this course of action is time and labor intensive, and would involve temporarily keeping traffic off of the approach entirely, we are loath to under take the project at this point in the year.

Until we are able to solve the problem in it's totality, we will be trimming these areas by hand so as to keep them from interfering with play.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

'Tis the Season

Rough.  I'm sure many of you have noticed it's length.  A few of you have even commented on it.  So I thought I could take a moment and address the issue. So here are a few facts to help you better understand the largest part of our course.

Bluegrass grows aggressively in the spring!
Mild temperatures and prominent rainfall make this time of year the premier time for plants to put on mass.  Because of this, spring is when the plant is diverting massive amounts of it's energy to material production. As such the grass requires much more frequent mowing to maintain a steady height.

Seed head production makes it worse!  
Seed heads make the rough play as though it's even thicker, and when it's already long this can be rather disconcerting. The production of seed is a biological imperative for all grass. We counter this on the greens, tees, and fairways by applying plant growth regulators which suppress this imperative. There is no way to make applying these to the rough time or cost efficient so our only option is to cut these structures off, but...


We inevitably spend some time catching up!
Currently we have at least one rough mowing unit running for eight hours every weekday- that's our entire work day. Ideally we put two more units out for 5 hours a day which gives us a total of three rough mowers, and 18 hours of mowing per week day! This means that any day that we get rained out or are other wise kept from mowing we lose 18 ours of work.

As we get into June and July the growth rate of the grass will slow and prove much easier to keep up with. Until then we will do everything we can to tame the beast. Thank you for your patience!

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

Practice Tee Renovation

 Today we began our practice tee renovation. We will be extending the back of the raised tee out eight feet to allow for a safer area of passage behind players on the mats. The first step in the process is stripping the sod currently there to clear for the material we will be adding.

     

Along with the extension, a natural fence of arborvitae trees will be planted to provide screening from thirteen green.  This is the beginning of our memorial tree program we will be implementing at Cress Creek.  Anyone who is interested can purchase an arborvitae to have dedicated to a loved one.  The way in which we will display each individual tree dedication is yet to be determined.  We are working on ideas; any you may have are appreciated. 

See you on the course!

Elliott Dowling

Your Grounds Crew

  I would like to take a moment to share a picture that was taken this morning with you. This is your 2011 Cress Creek Grounds Crew. Most are veterans though we have brought on a few new comers.  The gentleman over my shoulder to the right, and the gentleman two men to his right have between them more than 75 years of loyal service to Cress Creek Country Club. All of our crewmen have been and will be working hard for you all season long. Please don't hesitate to give them a wave when you see them out on the course.

I would also like to recognize three men in particular: Phil Kassinger, Jose Duran, and Lance Agne for their great work on the new restroom at number seven tee. This facility was envisioned by these three gentlemen and built via their sweat and elbow grease.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

A Few Observations on Our Expansions

As some of you may have noticed, there is a separation in development between the main body of our greens and the expansions installed during the renovation 3 years ago.  The above image captures this contrast perfectly.  The core pulled from the main stand of bentgrass shows almost 4 inches of root structure, while the core pulled from the expansion has just under 2 inches.  This lack of roots can result in excessive water loss, increased stress and slowed plant recovery.

We are and have been paying these areas special attention in an effort to combat these issues and keep your playing surfaces rolling true while restoring plant health. Both are important ingredients in great golf course.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling