update of goings on around the course

This week we are jumping into the heat and humidity. Luckily we missed the major thunderstorms predicted earlier this week. When it is very humid the last thing you want is super saturated soil. We have tried to be extra cautious with our water use this year and try as we might I feel we still could improve. You lose more turf when wet than dry. When grass turns brown from lack of water it is only going dormant. Once the moisture level raises the turf will recover and be green again. If you are overly wet the grass may turn brown from disease or wet wilt. A phenomenon where the plant wilts even though there is adequate moisture. I witnessed this last Friday on the blue tee on number seven. we had received rain and so the assumption is everything will be fine and yet this tee is showing all the signs of wilt. You still have to apply a fine mist of water to cool the plant down even though the soil is saturated. As we head into the hotter days of summer expect to see a few sprinklers running in the afternoon. This added water use only adds stress to our well and saltwater intrusion issues.

often times we switch to town water when we reach 1.0 on conductivity meter

I try to check the water often to monitor the salt level we are pulling in but often times it fall into the category of don't ask the questions you do not want the answers to. After close to a decade of dealing with this issue i can tell by the condition of the turf when we have reached the point of too much salt if there is such a thing. some people would consider ANY salt too much.

Two dark green spots in the middle: look like footprints?

Here is a picture of one of my favorite turf calamities. Bug spray damage. If you apply bug spray wile on the turf this is the result. scorched turf with foot prints left unharmed. please apply while on the path. This is damage that can be avoided.

extra windy day so the foot prints are to the left and the damage is all to the right

Not what you want to see first thing in the morning.

One of the latest thunderstorms did cause some issues in the pump house. We run on three phase 480 volt power and one of the legs went out, so this is what I came into one morning. The irrigation computer flashing and chiming this fault message. A call to Nstar and after a visit from them we were back up and running. Good thing too as we have spent many days this year repairing various issues with the irrigation



Kevin installing a new valve on the 8th tees



Will replacing a compression coupling that started leaking

A couple other projects over the last week: The "boys" Taylor and Mike finished weeding the clubhouse beds and mulched. We sprayed most of the crabgrass on the course. I used the big sprayer and did tees and Barry used the 25 gallon tank and did bunkers and other smaller areas. It is starting to check out and the grass around it is looking OK. Big change over last year where we killed everything but the crabgrass.

Mike and Taylor on the front lawn

dying crabgrass