Mink Meadows Turf Maintenance Department: Challenges

I feel stupid and uninspired writing about the weather every week but if you are on MV and attempting to play golf daily you will appreciate my frustrations. Overall we are in a cool wet pattern this season. This will slow growth which can be a good thing since it is hard to mow grass in the rain. Any traffic on water logged soils is bad as you can create ruts, compact the soil, tear the turf etc. Extreme wetness can also foster many turf pathogens if the grass never gets a chance to dry. Heavy rain followed by dry windy conditions is ideal. Cloudy misty for several days not so much. We lost Monday due to rain (1.3"), so we had to try and play catch up Tuesday on all of our mowing. Of course we had other plans already scheduled for Tuesday such as fertilizing fairways, and removal of a couple of dead trees. This is where the art part of what we do comes into play. We mow on a regular schedule when we can because that is necessary for consistent and healthy turf. Your fertility level has a major impact on growth rate so managing that part effects other parts. The delay in our fairway application was a blessing. Their slow growth means we can go long stretches and not have to bail hay when we do mow them. The fundamental rule is referred to as "thirds". You never want to take more than a third of the leaf off at a time. For example if you mow at 1" when the turf reaches 1.3" you should be mowing. I tell people if you mow without collecting clippings and you are making a mess and have to clean up the clippings than you are not mowing often enough. There is a caveat that timely mowing can be messy if done while the turf is wet so this really is for a dry cut. so what does that mean for a golf course? Greens-daily, tees approaches and fairways- three times a week, rough-twice a week. That is a lot of area to mow often. It is a major part of what we spend our time on and why the perception of being simply grass cutters is rampant. The purpose of this and most turf blogs is to highlight and explain all the facets of what it takes to maintain a golf course and if you read this often you will lose that perception and understand how complex the job really is.