Many of you know the name Steve Cook. He is the certified golf course superintendent and director of agronomy at Oakland Hills Country Club (and if you don't know the name "Steve Cook", you certainly know the name "Oakland Hills Country Club"). Wednesday Steve posted a blog discussing the dichotomy between the mentality that should accompany turf management with temperatures in the 70's or mid 80's, and the mentality that should accompany turf management in extreme weather conditions- I would think that the worst drought in a quarter century counts as "extreme"!
In his post, Steve uses a driving metaphor to explain what he calls a management "downshift": "...when the temperatures are North of 90 degrees, as in 97 degrees
Thursday, it's time to let up on the gas and downshift into a lower
gear. That kind of weather is not the time to be a hero and drive over
the cliff." The 97 degree Thursday that he mentions is the very same Thursday that brought us into the100's last week- the first 100 degree day in June in 24 years!
After reading what he had to say I felt I couldn't describe how grounds has been operating through this period of intense heat and drought any better. Click here to see the post in it's entirety. And it is important to remember that even though we have been lucky enough to see rain this weekend, our drought is nowhere near broken. We are still inches below the line that we would need to cross for that to be true.
See you on the course!
Elliott Dowling
