Hearty souls

With a high of 40 today and the greens back open our heartiest golfers came out to enjoy some winter sunshine.

cannot be too cold. one with no hat and only ball caps on the other two!

another group coming into the turn.

Root Pruning in January

We have some serious competition with tree roots in certain areas of the golf course because of the close proximity of trees. I purposefully left the two large oaks on either edge of the practice putting green some 10 years ago when we cleared the woods and built it. I thought they framed the green nicely from the clubhouse. Yet I still have the reputation as a "tree hater", go figure. Well for the first five years we had little issue other than the dropping of leaves, branches, acorns on the green surface. The last five years have been another story. Every year it is more difficult to keep the turf healthy adjacent to these trees. We did some root pruning this spring on the first green and then the entire length of the eighth hole. We never found the time to do this putting green. Yesterday we borrowed a wire locater and painted the irrigation wires and pipe so we could pick a spot to trench.

Will running sod cutter

Kevin removing frozen sod

The first step is to cut the sod and then remove it. We then run the trencher in the exposed area cutting through any roots. The trencher can cut through some pretty thick roots.

The next step is to fill the trench back in and put the sod back. If the roots were cut and no irrigation components then all is successful and we should get about five years of good growing before the roots encroach back into the green surface.

Essentially finished product.

Notice the weak turf area. You can still see the aerification holes and a few of the cup cutter plugs we took from the nursery to patch the thinnest spots. When we pulled the plugs out they were mostly tree root mass and not soil or grass roots. The root pruning will allow the turf to recover and thrive without the competition of tree roots.



Winter Play

An excerpt from the latest newsletter article on winter play on greens:

I would be re-miss if I did not put in a word or two about winter play on greens. By all accounts the recommended and preferred philosophy would be to stay off the greens entirely. At MMGC we have great sympathy for the brave and hearty souls that like to play the game all year in any conditions, so we have worked the best compromise to ensure the health of the turf and allow for the greens to be open as much as possible. “Frost Free or Fully Frozen” is the mantra I have tried to get across. When the greens are fully frozen and temps are at or below freezing we keep them open. Also if there is no frost in the ground at all we keep them open. It is when we have frost in the ground and the temps are above freezing that the top inch or two gets soft while the frost is breaking underneath. This is when they are most vulnerable to damage and we put the flag in the big cup in the fairway. Usually this is in the spring but can happen several times in the off-season as the temps fluctuate.

So we are in the thick of those conditions mentioned above. as the snow melts and the temps are high things will be soft and mushy. After this warm spell chances are good we will back on the greens fully frozen again or maybe just frost free and firm.
It is certainly more work for us to monitor the conditions and move the pins back and forth but we do this for the players who enjoy using the course all winter. We appreciate your understanding by staying off the greens in the times we have them closed