Course Conditions

Over the past few days the weather has brought us significant rain.  It has been one of the wettest springs on record and the course has thrived through it in good shape other then a few areas on the course which have not completely dried out. 
        Both the Lady's and Men's leagues have been cancelled today because of standing water on the golf course.  The course is ALWAYS OPEN to members and their guests who would like to walk the course when golf carts are not available.

Course Conditions

The rainfall and warmer temperatures have definitely added some challenges.  The grass seems to have grown inches over night during the last couple weeks.  The maintenance crew has been working hard to keep the rough mowed, and free of clumping grass (photo #4 rough).  The fairways and greens will be coming out of regulation, which means there will be more growth through the day.  Moisture and growth can decrease the distance of a tee shot that lands on the fairway.  Also as grass wants to aggressively grow on our greens, "green speed" is negatively effected.  We will be working hard at keeping the greens consistent and maintaining at our Statement of Standards.

Fairway fertilizer applications

We fertilized the fairways last Friday.  We use a service to apply our granular fairway fertilizers, which will generally be a spring and fall application.  The applicator truck shown in the photo, has wide floatation tires which prevents it from damaging turf.  The application is done in about 2 hours and is calibrated to give a consistent precise application. 

Poa seed head control

Over the past couple weeks we have been able to evaluate the effectiveness of our Poa seed head control.  The 2 main things that can effect control, are the products being used and their application rates, and most importantly the timing of application which is based on growing degree days (GDD).  This year we have had great success controlling the seed on greens approaches and fairways.  The grass has started to grow out of regulation and it is visibly apparent where seed is present.  The photo shows #14 fairway with a distinct white line of seed head, where the rest of the fairway was sprayed and has a nice green grass appearance.  You will also notice seed head in the second cut of rough on the edge of fairways where applications ended. 

Annual Bluegrass Seed Head Control

The Fairways, approaches and greens have been but under regulation to minimize the amount of seed head produced by Annual Bluegrass "poa" plants.  The Tees have not been treated the last few years, with the idea that the seeds help out in divot recovery in the heavily played areas.  The short play areas at Forest Lake consist of a large quantity of poa, mixed with bent grass and some rye grass on fairways and tees.  The poa this time of year produces stalky seed heads (shown in the second rough cut above), which will create a bumpy greens surface as well as make it very tough to achieve a quality mowing cut.  Although we would love to completely control the seed production, generally 80% control is very successful.

      This year we used 2 different products to control seed heads.  Both are very effective at achieving control which is a definite plus, as well as both slow down the growth of turf.

     Our fairways were treated this year with Embark ( photo on #7 fairway above right).  The appearance to these fairways has a yellow green color with speckles of darker greens which are grass varieties such as rye grass which are not effected.  This product is also very harsh on rough grass varieties so the application stopped before the edges of the fairway where you can now notice significant seed.  The upside to this product is that it is inexpensive. 

      The greens, approaches, and 10 fairway ( shown above left ) were treated with Proxy / Primo.  The obvious upside is a greener plant, even though there is a some color loss, and it is a much safer product on the rough grass surrounding greens.  This product combination has a significant increase increase in cost.

      All of the treated turf will come out of regulation in the next couple weeks.

Course Signage

We have but signs around the course to remind players that they can do their part to "CARE FOR OUR COURSE".   These reminders include Ball Mark Repair, Divot Replacement on tees and fairways when possible, as well as Keep Carts on the Path, which includes #2 fairway and the par 3's on the golf course.

Back Yard Maintenance

We have invested a few days already, and will be spending more of our time as it available in the back yard, pool and tennis areas.  We have pruned and trimmed many of our shrubs and plants and have begun mulching these areas.  Some plant material has suffered severe die back over winter.  This material will be removed or cut back back to new growth.