Scouting Report for October 28

~~The following is the C.D.G.A. scouting report as posted by Derek Settle, PhD~~

October 28, 2011 Scouting Report Coldest Week of Fall Yet: Earthworms Everywhere, Skunk Damage, Rust, and Tim likes Morton Arboretum's 41,000 Species Chicago/Northern Illinois Update: Derek Settle We just survived our first real chilly week of fall (Sunshine Course: 3 of 7 nights below 32˚ F). Most of what I now hear is that final golf course projects are complete or are in the home stretch. No more pest issues are being reported as cool nighttime temperatures are in control. This time of year we've concluded and are summarizing all studies on dollar spot and brown patch - creeping bentgrass is highly susceptible to both. It would prove to be our second stellar year of fungicide research and, as it turns out, a combination of heat and humidity is ideal for numerous plant pathogenic fungi (aka summers 2010 and 2011). Thankfully summer is a distant memory now and in November we'll continue a new North Central Region fertility trial and we'll finish a study with Dr. Bruce Branham and Bill Sharp that sought a new way to remove Poa annua without harming bentgrass in fairways. Meantime our superintendent Chris Painter shut down the irrigation system, other courses will follow. My scouting brought me close to animals this week? I saw an amazing amount of earthworms on fairways and more skunk damage on a rough in search of white grubs. Freezing temperatures and snow should be about a month away, but today a headline shared on Twitter said "Major October Snowstorm Targets Northeast". Uh Oh. Click here to view the October 28, 2011 Scouting Report. Have a great weekend and enjoy fall! Derek Settle, PhD Director of Turfgrass Program

Drainage Continues

The work continues on two fairway, where we are installing our most extensive lines of drainage. Anyone who's seen this fairway after a fresh bout of rain knows that the amount of drainage we are adding to it is no coincidence. Our crew has quite a few hours under their belt now as far as the process itself, and even on the cold, wet, miserable days that last week had to offer us their performance deserved nothing but high marks.

We are on schedule to finish our work on the fairway today. Next we will be crossing the cart path to number eight. It's hard, increasingly chilly work but spirits remain high.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

Scouting Report for October 21

~~The following is the C.D.G.A. scouting report as posted by Derek Settle, PhD~~

October 21, 2011 Scouting Report Cold, Windy and Wet: Dollar Spot's Last Dance, Rust Rages, Yellow Tuft, Earthworm Activity, and Tim's Nice Summary of Dollar Spot in 2011 Chicago/Northern Illinois Update: Derek Settle  It was Thursday and my daily notes said, "Clouds are above and light rain is falling. It all began Wednesday with 0.75 inch recorded on Sunshine Course." As it turned out, Chicago had been enjoying an Indian Summer the first two weeks of October, but by the 20th our high would not cross 50 degrees. Weathermen would tell us it was our coldest day since 26 May. It got windy too and little Sunshine Course recorded winds at 9-19 mph every hour that same day. Now that's unusual. Closer to Lake Michigan, Soldier Field would clock gusts of 53 mph and north shore places like Highland Park would feel winds of 45 mph. In the landscape the cold, wet, windy weather meant the peak fall color of many trees promptly ended. Within the week, cottonwood leaves would be completely down, though I had to wait to see the change - I was out of town. This week saw our first real hard frost as low temps dropped below 30 degrees in places like North Barrington and Aurora. Nevertheless, effects of a warm October are still with us and my weekly scouting would find terrific rust, amazing dollar spot, and that yellow tuft stuff. Superintendents noted earthworms had returned and course projects were in their concluding phases. Next up, irrigation pumps will be off and folks will say two short words - SNOW mold. Click here to view the October 21, 2011 Scouting Report. Have a good weekend and stay warm! Derek Settle, PhD Director of Turfgrass Program

Notes on the Nursery

Over the course of the year I have fielded a large volume of questions about the appearance and condition of our nurseries. While I certainly never would have guessed that the nursery of all things would be the source of so much conversation, I thought I would take a moment to address these questions and concerns by explaining exactly what the nursery is and how it is meant to be used.

The first and most straight forward of a nurserie's functions is to provide sod for repairs. By seeding and establishing separate stands of green, tee, and fairway turf we are able to affect minor and even some major repairs to damaged areas in house. Specialty sods like the fescue we used to repair south oriented bunker faces have to be ordered from area sod farms. However, the bentgrass sod on two fairway this morning was cut from the nursery not twenty minutes before it was laid. And because the nursery is maintained with all of the same practices as our course features, once installed it matches it's surroundings.

The nursery also serves as a sort of turf laboratory. Experimentation is in integral part of the scientific process and rather than experiment on the golf course, we perform them on the nursery. Want to test a new fungicide or fertilizer? We head to the nursery. Need to see exactly how a prospective piece of equipment operates? We take it to the nursery. Unsure about a new crewmen's machine operating skills? Nursery. And if the application rate is off, or the machine doesn't quite deliver as we expected, it's the nursery that suffers instead of your course. In some cases the turf will even die (the price of discovery) and if it does, we seed it and start over with the players none the wiser.

While it is important to maintain the nursery with the same practices as the course it is a separate entity. It is meant to serve function over form, with aesthetics being at the bottom of our list of concerns for it. As seasons come and go it will be burnt, killed, seeded, practiced upon and stripped bare in short order. And in all of these things it will be serving it's purpose.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

Bunker Face-lift

Before

The next time you play holes Three and Four you may notice the bunkers have gotten a bit of a face lift. It is no secret that some of our bunker faces have been suffering through out the year, especially the south facing surfaces which get the most sun. Some of the worst areas have been on holes three and four, with certain bunkers on these holes presenting completely dead faces.

Over the last two days Three, Four, and a few other areas have been sodded with a Fescue blend rather than our usual Bluegrass. I'm using this species because it is much better suited to hot, drought-prone soils, and should be able to out perform the Bluegrass on these south facing areas of intense sunlight and heat. While this certainly won't bring about an immunity to damage in these areas, it should give us a fighting chance at catching and addressing the hot spots as they intensify throughout the season.

After

During

See you on the Course!
Elliott Dowling

"What is the pile of material to the right of eight fairway for?"

If you've noticed the pile of soil, rocks and sod in the left-side rough of eight fairway you've probably wondered to yourself about where it was coming from and where it was supposed to be going. Let me take a moment to answer both questions. I'm sure you can all remember the many times we've had to restrict carts due to rain this year.  Each time eight and two were the wettest holes, with the rough on the right side of eight being extremely easy to flood.

We believe that a large part of the reason this area floods so quickly is that it is essentially the shape of a bowl, and so draws all the water from the surrounding highlands. In hopes of eradicating the problem, we have been depositing all the material excavated for our drainage project on two fairway on this area in eight rough. Once we've gathered it all, we will spread it across the area and level the surface.

I know the slowly growing pile may be unsightly, but believe me when I say it serves a distinct and important purpose.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

Scouting Report for October 14

~~The following is the C.D.G.A. scouting report as posted by Derek Settle, PhD~~

October 14, 2011 Scouting Report It's Cloudy: Goodbye Indian Summer, Dollar Spot Returns, Watching Yellow Tuft, Fall Color and Tim's Tenacity vs Bentgrass Update Chicago/Northern Illinois Update: Derek Settle An interesting week weather-wise. We continued a record pace of completely cloud-free days until Monday, October 8. On that day we saw 95% of full sun and it meant our record 8 days of 100% straight had come to an end. In the interim it was a nice experience. Arguably, we had experienced some of the best fall color ever to be produced by deciduous trees. The main thing is that rain, and associated wind, can easily knock colorful leaves off as their petioles teeter on the edge of senescence. Quick story. I met some out-of-town friends on Sunday. As I was passing through Millennium Park my eyes were filled with gold - the golden color of honeylocust and ash trees within the venue. I said, "To arrive in Chicago this week was just genius!" They agreed. In my scouting this week I saw a few things. I saw golf courses do their final push of core aerificaiton (greens and fairways). I saw dollar spot return (lows rose to 50˚). I saw yellow tuft continue to do its thing (bentgrass fairways). I saw a golf course continue drainage installation (on greens). I saw earthworms return (with rain). I saw leaves fall (with wind). I saw trees with great color (honeylocust, black locust, red bud, sugar maple, ash and cottonwood). I like to scout. Click here to view the October 14, 2011 Scouting Report. Have a great weekend and hold onto your hat - it's gonna get windy! Derek Settle, PhD Director of Turfgrass Program

"Why are some of the rear tees roped off?"

I'm sure many of you have noticed that the rear tees on numbers one, five, ten, eleven, and eighteen have been roped off- with he tee markers place on the forward tee instead. These tees have been closed for the remainder of the season so we can set about repairing and restoring them.

The hybrid tee system has the unfortunate side affect of channeling a larger portion of play to some of our smallest tee surfaces. This has meant increased wear on all the hybrid tees, but the tees mentioned above have suffered the most for varying reasons.  One and ten, as the first tees for the front and back nines, see very heavy usage- not to mention that most players hit  two or more balls from each of these. Other tees, like the rear tee on five, are very heavily shaded and so cannot recuperate with the speed and tenacity of other tees.

Whatever the reason may be, these six tees have taken the most punishment over the course of the season. We will be using this time to aerify, topdress and re-seed them.  Anything we can do to strengthen them we will do over the coming weeks. Losing them for the remainder of this year, allows us to concentrate our efforts on having them as ready as possible for next year.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

It's that time of year again, when then constant shower of red and gold quickly buries turf if left unchecked. Certain trouble areas, like the left-side bunker of number ten green, suffer the worst under this onslaught of leaves but no area of the course is safe. We have already begun removing and mulching at the highest volume we can muster.

Fall clean up is officially in full swing.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

A Note on Expansions

You may have already noticed that, with the exception of 10 and 9 green, the ropes protecting our newly seeded expansion have come down.  The leaf blades have now established themselves, and can resist light foot traffic. And with the root structure now in place, our young plants will be more inclined to stay in place rather than being pulled root and all out of the ground as they might have been when their roots were barely half an inch in length.

Let us not mistake better for best, or harder for hardest.  These plants are still far more tender than the fully established turf that makes up the rest of any given green, and as such still require your care in dealing with them. Though they may not be susceptible to any amount of traffic as they were before, but they are still sensitive enough to be damaged by a twisting foot or repeated ware. Relief should still be taken when your ball comes to rest in these areas, and when they can be avoided by foot traffic they should be.

I have removed the ropes for the aesthetic gain of having them gone, but they will be replaced without hesitation should our seeded areas come under abuse.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

Any Given Monday

Our tractor mounted aerifier worked on fairways all day without interruption.

I'm sure most people don't realize just how much time the grounds department looses to Cress Creek's many outings.  For anyone who's ever wondered what we do when we finally have the course to ourselves I thought I would share a couple pictures.

Our first leg of drainage for #2 Fairway

Yesterday, with the course closed and no outings scheduled we fertilized, aerified, and watered fairways. We also made good progress on number two fairway's drainage installation (though this is a project far from completion) and made protective applications to both the tees and greens. With tasks like spraying tees and greens and fertilizing fairways, having a a free Monday to complete many of them uninterrupted means you won't have to be interrupted by them later this week. Everybody wins!

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

Scouting Report for October 7

~~The following is the C.D.G.A. scouting report as posted by Derek Settle, PhD~~

October 7, 2011 Scouting Report It's October, It's Cloud-free: Enjoying Fall Colors and Indian Summer, Skunk Damage Means Grubs, Flowers Peak, and Tim says Sclerophthora macrospora Chicago/Northern Illinois Update: Derek Settle  So, it looks like I may have been out of town? You would be right and I missed some of the best weather the Chicago environment has seen all year. All I can say is rats! Soil temps are now below 60 degrees and root growth, of say creeping bentgrass, is now unencumbered by "supraoptimal temperatures". Many of our issues related to cool-season turfgrass, and for that matter landscape ornamentals, are root-related. Yet, we still have a poor understanding of roots, root diseases and root growth dynamics. When soil temperatures rise above 70 degrees we have real trouble maintaining root biomass due to a natural physiological decline. Now we are enjoying optimal root growth - these periods occupy a relatively short window in spring and fall. What else? Chicago's ash trees are now peaking in color while most maples and oaks have yet to do their thing. Chlorophyll, the green pigment in leaves, gets denatured as we experience cooler evening temperatures. Meantime, the reddish anthocyanins attached to sugars continue to accumulate in the leaves. It won't last long as senescence of leaf petioles is up next. But, for now it's all about yellow, orange, red and even purple. Did I say I like it yet? I do. Click here to view the October 7, 2011 Scouting Report. Have a good weekend and enjoy this wonderful run of nice weather! Derek Settle, PhD Director of Turfgrass Program

The Core Issue

Take a look at the picture I snapped on the course yesterday, I thought it was something everyone should see.  These are two samples taken  from the same green.  The difference? The upper sample was taken from one of our expansions- only weeks old. The other was taken from the main body of the very same green which has had years to establish itself and thrive. Samples like this are held together by the roots of the turf growing in them.  The more roots, the longer a sample will be.

Now take another look at the picture.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

Breakdown: Aerification

As so much of these last few weeks were spent discussing aerification, I thought a step-by-step explanation of exactly what we do during this time could be helpful to everyone. Please let me know if you have any questions!

Step 1: Core
The coring process is completed with one man walkers that must be guided across every square foot of the putting surface.  These machines have multiple arms,  that end in a total of twelve tines specially designed to remove material. Once driven in the ground they come up with small cylinders of turf, sand and soil called cores.  These are then removed from the green by a a shoveling crew.  This step is by far the most laborious and time consuming of the entire process.


Step 2: Topdress
Sand is spread heavily over the entire green. This is a type of sand meant especially to be used as a root zone. "But weren't we removing sand during our expansion project? Why are we putting it back in?" Yes, we were removing sand during the expansion. However, the sand we were removing was installed on mass in a single area. It was never amended and had no organic or soil content- which, in addition to the layering problem pure sand on clay caused- is why it eventually became a problem. The sand we are adding during this process is being added in small amounts across the entire green. Because of this the sand will work in conjunction with our soil profile and gain organic content from the layer of thatch that we have already established.

Step 3: Broom
The sand is then pushed into the holes through a process called brooming where a heavy duty broom is pulled behind a golf cart across the topdressing surface. Most holes will be filled by this process.

Step 4: Blow
Now we use a machine made up of a turbine with an attached nozzle to direct airflow to help force sand down into the open holes as well as to help open any holes that may have begun to collapse. This will also disperse any extra sand to other areas that might need it. Once We've made sure that all holes have been filled we will use the blower to evacuate all excess sand from the putting surface.

Step 5: Fertilize
Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind (in the right measure), and even though the aerification process may offer a lot in the way of plant health long term, here and now damage is still being done. To help the turf heal and knit together through our aerification holes, we follow up the process with an application of fertilizer.

Step 6: Water!
Also applied to help the turf bounce back, but it also brings with it the ability to wash fertilizer into the soil profile where the roots can have access to it, as well as any remaining sand that may be left on the surface.

See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling

Scouting Report for September 30

~~The following is the C.D.G.A. scouting report as posted by Derek Settle, PhD~~

September 30, 2011 Scouting Report Of 144 Years, We're Record Wet: Enjoying Fall Colors, Yellow Tuft of Bentgrass, Dollar Spot Ends, and Tim Tim says Mesotrione and Kentucky Bluegrass Chicago/Northern Illinois Update: Derek Settle As seasons go, I really like fall. I said that recently to a friend and was then reminded that our favorite season is sometimes just the one in which we currently find ourselves. I said, "Ok! Fall is my favorite!" As far as the seasonal life of plants go, we now have begun to move quickly. More and more, fall color has appeared in the landscape. The larger color palate now extends to lawns where tree leaves have begun to appear. In my neighborhood this week, I would see my favorite honeylocust trees give up about half their leaves - helped by 45 mph winds on Thursday afternoon. Oh, and at work I've begun to admire a couple of woody ornamentals I've otherwise walked by - white fringe tree, Chioanthus virginicus, and downy serviceberry, Amelanchier arborea. Currently, Chioanthus is a clear yellow and Amelanchier is a nice reddish-orange. As far as turf issues go, you won't hear many complaints from the land of cool-season turf. Our current soil temperature is optimal (roughly 60° at 2 inches). Also, our high/low values all week have been 60° by day and 40°-50° by night. Now that's nice! Lingering dollar spot has quickly faded now that nights are cool. Instead of plant health, talk this time of year focuses on course projects. "Glad aerification is complete and everything healed up. Working on leveling tees, next week we begin work on drainage for greens." On the last day of September...no complaints. Click here to view the September 30, 2011 Scouting Report. Have a great weekend. An Indian Summer is on the way! Derek Settle, PhD Director of Turfgrass Program