Heinz 57

Its finally raining!  Our weather station has recorded 1.2 inches. No carts today as the fairways are saturated.  If we receive additional rain today i will close the course but please call the pro shop to confirm. The rain has afforded me a few minutes to update the blog and explain how and why some of our fairways and tees look a little off color.

To start with yes i have been watering!  However, its been abnormally hot and dry for the month of June.  Evapotranspiration (ET) rates have been very high.  ET is the sum of evaporation and plant transpiration from the soil to the atmosphere.  When irrigating the goal is to replace 80% of what is lost to ET.  Replacing 80% of what is lost on the fairways on a daily basis is not an option.  The reason for this is cost since we purchase our water.  So, we must accept that the fairways will be a little off color at various times of the year.  The grass will recover when conditions are more favorable.

This hot and dry weather also illustrates our soil variances and plant types we have on our property.  Our greens, tees, and fairways all have different soil and grass types which some perform very poorly or conversely fairly well in this type of weather.  I will explain a very poorly performing fairway and a very good one. 

Our fairways and tees have a "Heinz 57" playing surface.  The tees and fairways are a mix of bentgrass, bluegrass, poa annua, fescue and even rye!  The rye grass i consider a weed which i have no means of eliminating unless i apply a non selective herbicide like Round Up.  Our least attractive and worst performing fairway is the 7th.


As you can see the fairway looks stressed out which is a result of poor soils that will not retain soil moisture.  This fairway and others were overseeded with rye grass at one point.  Planting rye grass was a huge mistake!  The rye grass is genetically engineered to perform well in hot and dry weather and is very green compared to the off color and stressed bentgrass and poa annua.

One of our best fairways even though it gets a little too wet is our 8th fairway.  The soil retains water well but more importantly it is comprised of 75% bentgrass with patches of poa annua and rye grass.  Hence a very consistent color and playing surface.



Monday i will be needle tining the greens.  This is routine greens maintenance that promotes a healthy exchange of oxygen into the root zone. 

Overall the golf course is in great shape! I hope everyone is enjoying the extra roll out in the fairways Ill see you out in the fairways!





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