Ever Improving Drainage

This past fall, a lot of time was spent making minor improvements to increase the efficiency of our fairway drainage systems. Major improvements were previously made during the course renovation, but the heavy rains this past fall pointed out a number of areas that need continued improvement. Unfortunately a handful of those areas will take resources and shaping skills that we cannot provide in house and, for those, a master plan will be developed. Each area will be prioritized and fixed when time and resources allow. As for the smaller, more manageable areas, we are able to address those ourselves and we already made good strides this past fall.

The areas we focused on the last few months were areas that didn't surface drain as fast as we needed. This was due to a number of issues. Some areas didn't have adequate fall and the velocity of the draining water wasn't high enough to remove it from the playing surface fast enough. In other areas, the water simply had too much ground to cover before reaching a basin.

We went about fixing the insufficient slope issues in one of two ways. We either increased the percent slope along the entire run of the waterway through grading or by lowering the basin itself. These promoted higher water velocities along the run of the drainway and entering the basins.

The areas that simply relied on surface drainage for too long of a stretch were fixed by grading in and installing small inlets throughout the entire run of the waterway.

 Below are photos of some work we did on Gray Hawk #1

 

Below are photos of some work we did on 1 Black Bird

Gray Hawk Warranty Work Complete

Duininck Golf was recently back in town to finalize some of the finishing touches on the Gray Hawk rebuild. With any grading and drainage installation project, soil settling is expected and ours was no exception. Last year's dry conditions made the soil very difficult to work with, so we expected a little more settling than in past years and we were right. A small crew was brought in to regrade the basins to recapture the intended slopes. In addition, some inlets were lowered and irrigation heads were leveled. Then, these areas were seeded and hydromulched. With a little warm weather and moisture, we hope to have these areas well on their way to being grown in by the time the snow falls. 

 

Is this the end of the settling? Most likely not. The course will continue to settle for many years to come. The rate of settling will change from year to year based on many factors, including seasonal moisture rates and the severity of freeze/thaw cycles, but we will continue to address the problem areas as they appear. You can play your part in helping reestablish these areas by keeping cart and foot traffic out of the roped and staked areas. 

1Gray Fwy

 

1 Gray Fwy

 

 

1 Gray Fwy



6 Gray Fwy

 



6 Gray Fwy

 

 

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Etiolated Tiller Syndrome

In order to continue to improve the health of some of the problem greens, I have enlisted the help of many others in the agronomy field. I have reached out to diagnostic labs throughout the Midwest, universities from both coasts, and the USGA. In this search for any and all possible problems (beyond the ones my eyes and experience can identify), we may have found one possible underlying issue. The last samples tested showed signs of bacterial streaming, which is the flow of bacteria from a cut leaf blade. Following a period of isolation, the bacteria proved to be Acidovorax avenae. The presence of this bacteria has been loosely linked to Etiolated Tiller Syndrome (ETS).

This is an extremely understudied syndrome that not many people know much about. In fact, there are many out there that still cannot agree on whether ETS is a symptom or the cause of a symptom. Research on this issue continues to increase and will hopefuly shed more light on the possible effects of this syndrome. I emphasize the word "possible" because it isn't known to what extent ETS is an issue. Many believe it is simply an aesthetic issue, while others are not sure.  I believe ETS is a secondary issue brought on by high moisture content in the soils combined with the use of bio stimulants and products containing plant hormones. It just seemed too convenient that we were seeing symptoms on our greens that consistently hold more water and also have a much heavier silt layer in them.

The physical symptom of ETS is elongated leaf blades that exhibit accelerated growth rates. These leaf blades appear lime green in color because the chlorophyll is dilluted over a larger surface area. I was assured that these leaf blades are photosynthetically functional and the root samples I have pulled have all been adequate to great. Even if the plant is perfectly healthy, I do believe the elongated leaf is structurally weaker and far more prone to mechanical damage and foot traffic.

Note the lighter green turf. These symptoms appeared around the end of June.

In an effort to get ahead of any issues, we have tried to remove as much mechanical stress as possible from our management routine, as well as give some of the newly constructed areas on Gray Hawk some timeoff. We have begun push mowing the troubled greens to eliminate the stress of the riding mowers and are keeping the greens on a much more aggressive venting cycle.  A concerted effort has also been made to increase air movement in some of our pocketed green locations. Every superintendent I have spoken with was adamant about the improvement they see from air movement and the use of turf fans. This explains the tree removal that took place on #5 Gray Hawk, as well as the use of the fans around that green. We are also experimenting with a different watering technique. With this method, we flood the soil profile and then gradually dry it down until the moisture looses contact with the root system, at which point we flood it again. It seems to take about a week to complete this cycle. We hope this will provide adequate moisture without keeping the profile bogged down.

As I walked the greens the past few weeks, and my wife will attest that I have walked them alot, I really feel like they are healthy. The root systems seem dense and deep. We need to continue to keep an eye on our watering techniques and try to manage water away from the surface by pushing it down toward the root system. We also need to manage wear and tear in certain areas and allow areas of new or stressed turf to have a break every now and then.

Roots system on #5 Gray Hawk green

Use of fans and tree removal on #5 Gray Hawk green site

Course Update

The course seems to be handling the spring fairly well. The putting surfaces were lagging slightly due to the cooler, wet weather, but with the recent warm temperatures and sunshine, they seem to be waking up. Hopefully not too much.

We have dropped the height of cut on Red Feather and Black Bird greens quite a bit and anticipate that, in time, this will result in smoother, quicker greens with a much finer texture. Unfortunately, the greens on Gray Hawk will be maintained at a slightly higher height with higher nutritional inputs to aid them through their first year. This will result in greens that are slightly slower and maybe not quite as smooth. We contemplated leaving the greens on Red Feather and Black Bird a bit taller to provide consistency between courses, but it is time that the older greens are maintained the way they are meant to be.

       

#9 Gray Hawk from the new black tee

The grow-in of the fairways on Gray Hawk has suffered the most from the cool, wet temperatures. The soil temps couldn't seem to maintain adequate levels to promote germination and growth. We will continue to push these fairways, but the heat of the summer is right around the corner, which, for all intents and purposes, will shut down any further improvements in density. Cart path restrictions on Gray Hawk will be lifted this Saturday with the understanding that any indication of major traffic stress throughout the summer, the restrictions can be reimplemented. With as little maturing time as those fairways have had, it will be important that we "baby" them as much as possible. The more turf we can get through this first year, the better they will be entering 2014.

 

#4 Red Feather from the black tee.

#8 Gray Hawk Main Line Repair

It never fails that the spring charge-up of the irrigation system brings with it a few repairs. In most cases, we are dealing with small diameter pipe, lateral feeds, and broken heads. This year, however, we faced something a bit more daunting. We found the couplers on the 10" mainline leaving the Gray Hawk pump station had failed and were leaking extensively. These had to be repaired to prevent a catastrophic mid-season failure.

Careful excavation was critical to avoid any contact with power and signal wires

as well as any collateral damage to the stable pipe.

We found that the gasket within the band coupler (not the best choice for this particular joint) had failed and water was escaping from this point.

We removed the old couplers and schedule 40 pipe and spent the next couple days trying to find new pipe somewhere close by. All we found in the area was schedule 40 140lb test pipe and I wasn't comfortable using this. We finally found the C900 pipe which should be well suited for this application.

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To avoid the same problem down the road, we upgraded to a mechanical joint/mega lug coupler. These are pretty heavy fittings and a bit cumbersome to work with. Fortunately, our pipes lined up and the couplers slid on relatively easily.

All that is left to do is splice our power wires, backfill the hole, and charge the system. Nate Phillips, Jeff Moeller, Tyler Welp, Kurtis Burden and Rich Lee all played a role in fixing this pipe. Their work is greatly appreciated.

Spring 2013

Omaha caught a few days of favorable weather in the past week and we were able to get the entire course mowed at least once. For the most part, the course looks like it is in good shape. We experienced a fairly good green up over the weekend and expect this to continue. We still need some warmer days to get the soil temperatures rising before the course really wakes up and we can assess how we overwintered. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like this week's weather will be of much help in that department. The forecasted moisture will be great, but the temperatures will keep the turf in a holding pattern.

As the fairways continue to green up, you will notice some patchy areas of straw-colored turf. This is dead Poa Annua and it's death is by design. The battle with Poa is an ongoing one. Each fall we spray a herbicide to help reduce its population, but the effectiveness of the application cannot be judged until the spring. This year it appears that we had a pretty good kill. As soon as the course dries up next week, will begin to overseed the areas with Ryegrass. The germination rate of Rye is very quick, so the damaged areas should recover quickly

Poa Control In Fairways

As a result of this years normal freeze/thaw cycle, you may notice that some bunker liners and staples have been forced to the surface of the bunkers. Repairing this is a priority and will be taken care of ASAP. Repairing this properly and in a clean fashion is important because we do not want to contaminate any sand during repair. Please keep an eye out for these areas when you are hitting your bunker shots.

Bunker Liner Migration

We recently pulled the covers from the greens on Gray Hawk and were very pleased with what we found. The greens seemed to have continued to fill in late into the fall and started up early this spring. They are on track for an opening day of June 1st. 

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#7 Gray Hawk Green Post Cover Removal

#9 Gray Hawk Green Post Cover Removal

Our main focus going forward will be interseeding fairways, roughs, and tees. We will also dial in our nutritional plan to help the turf recover from last year's stresses and get ready for this years aerification. It is really important that the plant be healthy and full of vigor at the time of aerification to help speed recovery.

As I mentioned above, I think we overwintered well and, with some cooperation from the weather, the course should really come to life in the next 10-14 days.

Moving Large Caliper Trees

Due to new tee locations on a few holes on Gray Hawk, we were forced to move some trees. Last week we fired up the 90" tree spade and, after the repair of a hydraulic leak, went through the process of moving them.

Moving trees with a trunk caliper greater than 8" is not a process I am entirely comfortable doing. Trees of this size need a much larger root system than the 90" spade is able to transplant. The removal of such a substantial chunk of the trees roots will often lead to death and always leads to a few years of stunted growth. That being said, we do own the spade and have a very capable, experienced operator, Joe Kirk, so we attempted it ourselves. In the end, if the trees don't pull through, we haven't lost too much.

I have included some pictures below of our spade and a video of the process. The video is not of our moving process but our process followed the exact same steps. If you are interested in planting trees in your own home landscape, this time of year is an excellent time.



Gray Hawk Construction Update

 The construction on Gray Hawk will wrap up over the next couple of days. All that remains are "punch list" items and the leveling of a few irrigation heads. All and all, the project went very smoothly.

The dry soils made shaping, grading, and backfilling a bit more difficult, and I will be interested to see if we have more settling this year than in years past.  

Green, tee, and fairway germination rates have been the highest and most consistent we have seen with any of the renovations. We will mow fairways for the second time tomorrow at a height of 1". The more we can mow these fairways, the faster they will reach their desired density. We are pushing them a little more this year by using biweekly foliar Urea applications. The low overnight temperatures expected at the end of this week could slow their progress, but we will have to wait and see.

I couldn't be more pleased with the way greens are growing in. We made a couple of minor changes to the way we prepared the greens to receive seed and they have made all the difference. Greens have been mowed six times and are down to a height of .190". We will start mowing them daily until growth slows and hope to get them down to a height of .150" by the end of the season. Their density gets better by the day. Topdressing and foliar fertilizer applications will be the key to getting the greens as mature as we can before winter. Rolling will also become important as we try and smooth out all the humps and bumps created during the regrassing process.

As the grow in continues, my focus will shift toward tree replacement. With all renovations, there has to be some tree removal and it is important to replace these.  Now that the holes are taking shape and we can envision how they will be played, we can start to add trees. This is one of my favorite aspects of the process. The correct placement of a tree can have a long lasting impact on how the hole looks and plays.

#5 Gray Hawk from 200 yards



#6 Gray Hawk from 300 yards

#7 Gray Hawk from 200 yards

#2 Gray Hawk green 30 days after seeding

#2 Gray Hawk green 30 days after seeding

Course Update

 

I'd like to apologize for the lack of posts in the past couple of weeks. Last week was spent aerifying the course which is a process that always seems to eat up most of my time. A huge thank-you goes out to the members of my crew for putting in the long hours it takes to complete the job. I would also like to thank all the golfers for their patience during this process.

The greens are healing from the aerification process fairly quickly. With cooler weather in the forecast, we expect this process should speed up by the end of the week.

Now that aerification is finished, we will shift our focus back to over-seeding thin areas on fairways, tees etc... This seeding will likely continue for the foreseeable future, as I would like to move out into the rough and repair areas that were lost to the drought.

As we approach fall we are beginning to prioritize our list of late fall/winter projects. Here are a few of the things we want to address:

1. Add and/or move specific irrigation heads to provide better coverage for years like we have recently experienced.
2. Improve or add drainage to some low areas on the course. An example of an area would be along the west side of the cart path running between #1 Black Bird fairway and #2 Black Bird tee complex.
3. Re-edge bunkers on the Black Bird course.
4. Raise and level low irrigation heads throughout the course.

The renovation of Gray Hawk is moving along very well. All fairway and tee box seeding has been completed and the sod work is drawing to an end. All of the greens are growing well thus far. This is the most consistent germination we have had throughout the three years of renovation work. The hot temperatures we experienced the two weeks following seeding may have slowed initial growth a bit, but the cool nighttime temperatures have helped alot. The cooler forecast for the end of this week should real kick things into gear.

With all the major tasks completed, we could use a good rain to help things fill in. 

 

 #4 Grow-in underway

 

#7 Fairway bunkers are sodded

 

#7 View of green complex from 200 yds

 

#3 Fairway just prior to seeding

Course and Construction Update

We were fortunate to catch some cool weather and rain last week which has really helped the course. The over-seeding process began last week and most of Red Feather and Black Bird fairways are complete. We have really started to see some good germination in these fairways. This process will be put on hold temporarily as we gear up for aerification next week.

 

Our aerification process will be very similar to the one we used this past spring.We will again be pulling 5/8" cores on the greens and 1/2" cores in the fairways and collection areas. In addition, we will core all the tee surfaces this fall. This is something that hasn't been done since I started at Indian Creek.

 

Construction is going well and deadlines are being met. All of the greens were seeded earlier this week and the sodding of the greens complexes will be complete by the end of day on Friday. Once the green complexes are sodded, we can really start throwing water to the greens. Gray Hawk is slowly shaping into a great golf course. I firmly believe we saved our best for last.

 

All in all, it appears we have survived the summer and are well into the recovery period. For now, let's hope for cooler weather and additional rain. Take a look at some pictures of the construction process below. I hope you all enjoy your Labor Day weekend. Football season is here - GBR!!! 

 

Sodding green side bunker on #7 Gray Hawk

 

Seeding collection area on the back of the green on #5 Gray Hawk.

 

#2 Gray Hawk green complex after sod and seed.

 

Installing a riser to match irrigation head with new grade.

 

#4 Gray Hawk green complex after sod and seed.

Gray Hawk Construction Update

 

Below are a few pictures of some greens complexes prior to sod installation. Greens were seeded today and we hope to have all of the greens complexes sodded by this weekend.

 

#1

 

 #2

#3

#4

#6

 

 #8