Spring?

Well Spring has officially begun. You would not know it by the snow on the ground, temperatures and another Nor'easter bearing down on us. I documented a few more trees that have been damaged in the storms. Some work is getting done whether cleaning the course again or spreading the marsh spoils on the outside corner of number 2. I have decided to plant that area to pollinator habitat. It was full of scrub oak, invasive Russian olive and poison ivy. I think adding to the habitat for bees and butterflies will be a great thing and blend with our environmental approach.

More tree damage

Marsh spoils spread out on #2

Last storm had blowing wet snow

Fast 3-Weeks

It must be Spring since that was one of the fastest 20 days, since my last post, I can remember. A lot has happened with many things coming together to prepare for our first tournament. Much of the work was simply mowing on a more consistent basis. I have written in these pages how important mowing is and explained the basic rule of thirds, or so I thought. I looked for the post to add a link but could not find it amid the 329 posts! I know I did a Toastmasters speech about it so here is a bumper sticker: Never cut more than a 1/3rd of the leaf blade at one time. This is very stressful to the plant and also confusing. It gets accustomed to a height and the more you mow it the thicker it will get. So when you let your lawn grow for weeks on end then hack it down, it usually turns yellow as it goes into shock. It may also thin out from that stress. By getting the course mowed on a consistent basis the turf just looked tighter and more healthy. Mowing is all based on growth rate so as the weather improves and the turf starts to grow you increase the mowing to match. Notice I did not say anything about fertilizer. People use way too much fertilizer. As I drive around there are lawns so green it hurts my eyes. It does not look healthy to me, instead it looks fake and I know it is forced. I have applied to greens only .06 #'s of nitrogen on 4/28 as a liquid spray, and then this week as part of aerifying .32 #'s as an organic based granular. That's it for nitrogen on the entire course so far. We ALL are regulated to 3 #'s of Nitrogen /1000 ft2 per season on MV. Train yourself away from the technicolor green Scotts has brainwashed you to think is what a good lawn is supposed to look like. They are a fertilizer company so of course they want you to run out and "feed it" as often as you can. Look for all the subtle colors throughout a landscape even among the green. Enough soap box.

Red Top in fescue area # 8

6th hole last week - NO Nitrogen applied

Another project we tackled was to replace/add the heat shrinkable vinyl to the bunker rakes. Before this product came to the golf market rake handles would become faded and even degraded to the point that you could get fiberglass splinters. We tried amorall, paint, rotating the handle to spread the exposure, you name it. I used to have two sets keeping the best ones for "in-season". Since Vinyl Guard they look brand new for years even when out in the sun year-round. It took all day to take the old vinyl and grips off and apply the new ones but the end result is worth it. See the pictures below:

This was under the old vinyl

The greens have been aerified and topdressed and are recovering nicely. Much like a human patient and a surgical procedure the healthier you are before hand the better the recovery. The greens were so good this Spring and they got there because of aerifying and have taken the process well because of their health. A little heat will help but unfortunately we are in a cold spell at the moment. Sunday's rain will help wash in that topdressing. Happy Mother's Day

sunrise today 5/11/17 4th hole

Spring- officially here & chasing a leak underground

They are Back!

Well it is official, Spring is here because OUR osprey is back. Who cares about Belle? Actually it has been great to watch her progress, as of yesterday she was in CT. Ours was spotted yesterday as he/she flew right over the maintenance building. One of my favorite osprey memories is watching one fly into a dead tree right next to the shop trying to break off a branch to add to the nest. It was impressive.

Murph mowing greens for second time this week

The season has officially begun in my opinion because we started mowing. We tried an official "opening day" once but it really does not work when you are open all the time. There is something special when the greens get mowed and start to look and feel like greens again. We mowed Monday, then rolled Tuesday and then mowed again Thursday. I applied the Spring seed head suppression application. This product keeps the annual bluegrass (Poa Annua) from seeding. This will keep the greens smoother through the seeding process. As we convert the greens to more and more bentgrass this application will change to a Poa killing application. Well maybe not killing but certainly one which will put a severe hurting on it. Right now we still have a bit too much to take such extreme measures. The next post will explain how this product works and show some of the test plots we have set up to test the effectiveness and best timing for it.

Finally

With an 81 year old irrigation system that has main lines about 6 feet deep there are bound to be issues right? One of the main issues is that we drain really well and if there is a small leak we never know where it is. We have a small submersible pump in a small well that maintains the pressure in the system, 115 psi for those interested. For context the pressure on municipal water supply to your residence is 40-70 psi. We live and die by the cycle of this pressure maintenance pump (pm pump, or pm cycle). It tells us how tight the system is and whether or not we have any leaks and how bad. The pumps have settings for major blow outs and will hopefully shut down before doing extreme damage to the ground around the break but for smaller leaks they do not know the difference between that and us watering. Hence the reliance on the pm cycle. Historically we start the season in the high 20's and eventually settle out in the mid teens. Murph and I look at this cycle constantly. It is usually the first thing I do when I wake up, checking the irrigation system to see what kind of day I will be in for. We live every day waiting for failure due to the age of the system. 

I can honestly say this is the most excited I have been for a leak

Well, last Fall the pm cycle dropped to 4 minutes for weeks on end. We drove around and around looking for weepy heads and leaking pipes to no avail. We came up with a plan to open the system in small stages hoping to pinpoint the leak. This never really came to fruition since a couple of the fairway valves would not hold and filled with water against our best efforts. The newer system from the 90's is plastic and really the worst part of our system or the part that gives us the most trouble. The glued joints on this system are starting to fail and there are literally thousands of them so our worry was that maybe we do not have one big break on abandoned galvanized pipe down deep but many small leaks on plastic all over. After 4 days of tinkering with the system partially filled up, at an increased pressure of  120, the leak finally improved enough to show itself. I can honestly say this is the most excited I have been for a leak. At least I can stop worrying about where and when and whether the pm pump is going to burn up from such a short cycle.  

With a big storm predicted for today and tomorrow the sunrise was really good. Cheryl took these above. Mine are below and were too early and I was already off to work when it peaked.

Great Winter Weather

I saw a graphic on Twitter from the National Weather Service comparing the weather from Dec and now. The parallels were uncanny which did not need explaining to anyone here since we are living through this miserable weather. I cannot believe it has been 3 weeks since the last update. We have obviously been busy prepping the course for the season. Lots of irrigation repairs, a bit of tree work, we even managed a deep tine aerification on the greens. It continues to be cold and rainy. Since March 1st we have received 11.44" with 1.83" in the last 5 days alone. The course has taken it and remains quite playable. The leaves are starting to pop on the trees and more golfers are appearing every week. Some of the highlights from the last 3 weeks are below:

Fairway Fred Pekari turned 80 so we threw him a party

aerified shallow pipe the installers laid on a boulder

more shallow pipe they pulled over a pile of rocks

watering in topdressing after aerifying. Only did it once then it rained every day since

one of many dead oaks Will cut down

tournament Sunday had an amazing sunrise

Spring Snow and a visit to one of the best courses in New England

It is not uncommon to get a few flakes in the Spring. Such was the case this week. It did not last long but is always a reminder that we are not over the hump for good weather yet.

9th hole Monday

1st hole Monday People actually tried to sled and built a sad little snow man

1st hole 24 hrs later on Tuesday

Cheryl and I went to New Haven to visit our son Josh and catch a show at his theater. We also had a blast playing the Golf Club at Yale. I sent Scott an email saying I promised not to judge since none of us wants guests this time of year. He said they just opened that Friday and we would have to walk. No problem we said. Really steep hills there but worth the effort. Here is an article I just received on the Superintendent: Scott Ramsay, CGCS and his involvement in the politics of our industry.

Cheryl teeing one up

9th with the famous ridge in the middle

Loved this hole especially the bunker on the left

cannot even see the sand from the fairway

sand goes right to the ledge.... so cool

So many great holes. Lots of movement and elevation

Lots of recovery and the lab results are back

We have some crows poking lots of holes on 9 and 6. They are not doing much damage but the question is what are they going after?

crow damage 9 Fwy

I returned to the Island after attending the local conference and show put on by the New England Regional Turfgrass Foundation. I have been on this board as a representative for the Cape Superintendents Association for several years. Currently I am President so it was an interesting show with added responsibility. Always up for a challenge I embraced this time and had a great show. I was even fortunate to introduce the keynote speaker John Dennis. Formerly of channel 7 Boston and currently WEEI sports radio and The Dennis Callahan Show

Me and John Dennis after his speech

Upon my return Thursday I walked the course w/ Bert of course and saw a marked improvement in the cold temp injury areas. I also noticed how clean the place is. Will and Chris have done a great job getting ready for another great season

8 Green Thursday

8 Approach Thursday

8 Fwy Thursday

9 Fwy Friday

Folk Art 8 Fwy Friday

From Dr. Mitkowski at URI who looked at our samples last week:

"Very good recovery over the weekend.  The dead leaves are dead but plants very healthy and new leaves produced almost immediately.  These have had 24 hour light and 75 degree temps."

These plugs were solid yellow and ugly went i sent them in so great news. Of course it has been cold this week and it is snowing as I type this so recovery will not be this rapid. Forecast is good for next week and the grackles and red wing blackbirds have returned so Spring is upon us.

Greening up! First Mowings

As a quick update things are progressing nicely. The saying is you cannot cheat the calendar so all though we had a slow start by a certain date everything is back to normal. The trees are budding, The osprey's are back, The turkeys too and the grass is starting to grow. Fairway Fred is back at it with the first mowing this week. We mowed tees also this week for the first time. The winter damaged areas on 3 green and the practice green do not look that much different and only time will tell whether they actually recover fully. The plugs I pulled out and grew in my office for a week were put back into the nursery and look pretty good so I am still optimistic.

4 from the left rough

3 green. Dye has not worked any magic yet

plugs from 3 green back in the nursery

Tom's are out strutting their stuff

New irrigation system computer upgrade

I spent a portion of last weekend driving to VT to help my son Josh pack up and move his belongings to a storage unit in New Haven CT. He has left Nectars night club in Burlington for a post as the stage manager of the former Paradise Theater which is being revamped and called College Street Music Hall http://collegestreetmusichall.com/concerts/. It is right across from the Shubert Theater. He has also secured a part time job back in the golf business at Race Brook CC. Now if he could only find a place to live his mother could start sleeping again. In the move he had an old monitor that I was able to procure. With the new irrigation software we installed a map feature. The new software is area based so having the map is a great way to re-train your brain away from the old number based system.

I have looked at the Tee-up NE auction and there are certainly some DEALS to be had. It ends Monday so check it out and help support turf research in New England.

Catching up on turf conditions & Tee-Up NE

I would be remiss in my duties if I did not mention the damage we have suffered from the Winter weather. Amazingly the majority of the course looks great. I thought for sure we would have damage on fairways where we have in the past. They were under water several times going into winter and some under ice coming out. So far it look like they will be fine. The greens looked very good also as they came out of ice and snow cover. The 3rd had a small section in the middle that looked a bit off but that was about it. As the frost came out of the ground and we had a few freeze thaw cycles the 3rd and the putting green regressed. The entire right side of 3 looked dead quite frankly while the PG had only two small patches. Standard operating procedure is to take a sample (plug) with a cup cutter and bring it inside to incubate in a sunny window. If it lives you have a decent chance the rest of the area will as well.

good news after only a few days inside

bottom of picture is the plug from the nursery

under magnification there was healthy turf. another good sign

As the pictures show it looks as though the turf will recover. Never any guarantees but a good sign to see green in the sheath  under magnification and then growth after a bit of heat being inside. So what happens now for the greens? Well we could cover the bad areas and try to promote some warming of the soil or we could wait for Mother Nature to wake up and send us some heat. The forecast this week showed little sun so a cover would not gain much. Plus 3 green gets very little sun to begin with (might there be a correlation there as to why this is the only green with this much damage?) We have plenty to do still cleaning up the course and trying to get the irrigation system on so baby sitting covers is not that appealing. It would also mean a temporary on 3 and the natives have suffered enough so we will wait. If this is our only damage after that Winter I feel blessed and have very little to complain about. It is that time of year again where we enjoy the epitome of green and opulence aka The Masters. I would like to continue to plant the seed so that you all link the end of the tourney with the beginning of the Tee-Up NE golf auction. This is a fundraiser for turf research in New England. We get clubs to donate rounds of golf and then have an online auction where you the golfer get to win and support turf research. http://www.tee-upnewengland.com/

Shout it from the roof tops!

It is official we are open. I took a tour Monday and decided the hazards had melted enough to be able to stick some pins in the ground. We had one lone golfer. Not surprising since there was no sun an odd snow flake, or rain drop and generally raw conditions. I will leave the guessing as to who our "odd snow flake golfer" was but suffice to say he made the turn in the drizzle and played 18. The next morning Bobby Rose walked 9 and then Dan McCarthy and Bruce Stone played in the afternoon. It was a beautiful day with full sunshine and a crisp ocean breeze. Rusty Hitchings even made an appearance to chip a few balls on the practice green. I dragged him out for a tour and we got stuck on the 5 Tee cart path.

4 Green path

In the continuation of "first time I have ever done that" I had Will clear two sections of cart path with the bobcat. It is the only thing keeping us from letting carts out. The section in the picture above was passable but the section by the 5 tee still had enough snow to strand a golf cart. I sent Chris out with the bunker rake and a shovel this morning. What a crazy year. It sure feels like an April Fools joke to head to the beach to start the channel dredge and clear snow off a cart path.

9 green Monday evening after storm passed

My back yard this weekend. It did flurry on MV also

The pro-shop opens today so carts will be available from now on weather permitting. Here's to the start of what I hope will be a great season. I thought it was very fitting when Bruce gave me the 2014 West Tisbury Annual Report yesterday. They paid tribute to their long time Moderator and our beloved member and friend by putting his picture on the cover. It is hard to imagine that he is gone and that it is less than a year since his senseless murder in California. It gave me comfort to take a picture of it on the first fairway with a few golfers in the back ground. You all know he would have been thrilled to see the course opening up.

Every course should have a smiling Irishman