FROM THE SUPERINTENDENT July 15, 2017
LET THE GROW-IN BEGIN! Yesterday, we sprigged 12 of the greens and will complete the remaining on Saturday morning. We are officially beginning to grow new Champion Bermuda grass! I have included several pictures of the sprigging process plus we will post several videos on the website. We also had our drone up in the air taking some great videos. We should have that posted on the website in the next few days. Sprigs are small plant parts, which usually contain rhizomes or stolons. Sprigs are produced from tearing turf into plant parts. The sprigs then are kept under refrigeration and shipped to the site. Once sprigs are planted, new plants are developed from the nodes that start to grow and produce roots and shoots. The young plants develop additional plants, and as they mature, a sod-forming turf occurs. Once the sprigs are down, we will start watering immediately. It is critical that we keep the sprigs wet so you will see the sprinklers running constantly every day. Once the sprigs begin to root, you will see green grass appearing. This usually takes 2-3 weeks.
After the sprigs are spread over the entire green section, we use the greens rollers to roll over the sprigs. This presses the sprigs into the greens mix. Once this is complete, we spread a heavy layer of greens mix over the sprigs. This is called topdressing. The sand helps hold the sprigs in place and also retains water, which keeps the sprigs wet.
PROGRESS OF OTHER PROJECTS: During the last 10 days, we have been working on several other projects besides prepping the greens for new grass. Fairway Verticutting: I’m sure if you live on the golf course or drive by daily, you have seen the fairways on the back nine turning brown. This is a normal reaction to the verticutting process. We removed a significant amount of thatch from the fairways which caused the fairways to be spongy and soft. I’m sure you noticed that when driving carts across the fairways they tended to swerve. This was caused by the thatch and grain in the turf. We have removed most of the thatch and grain so the fairways will be firmer and the ball will roll farther. After we vacuum the thatch, what’s left is the healthy Bermuda ready to begin growing again. It takes about a week for the fairways to turn green again so please don’t worry, the fairways are fine!
Short Game Practice Area: We started work on the practice area next to the Maintenance facility this week. We began by stripping all the old turf and creating a berm along the entrance road. We also graded the surrounding area to increase the amount of usable turf. This will allow for multiple stations from which to practice. After tracking the wire around the green, we determined that there was no drainage under it. The first step was to dig trenches to install drainage pipes to move the water.
Once we had the trenches dug and the pipe installed, we began covering the pipes with gravel and finally greens mix. This is a blend of sand and organic material in which the grass will grow. We also decided to greatly increase the size of the green for more practice area.
After the greens mix is in place, we roll the green to make it firm and start to water.
Finally, the last step was to finish grading the area around the greens. This included dragging the area to remove all the rocks and sticks.
READY FOR GRASS!