My Time at Stone Creek Golf Club: Monday, July 19th, 2010

Conditions

As I read through some of my peer's blogs from around the country I see a common thread this time of year, heat and humidity. I have got to hand it to some of those guys that live in some of the most undesirable climates this time of year. It is a 24/7 job to keep turf alive and healthy and there are so many talented superintendents that make it look so easy. It simply makes me feel lucky to be dealing with high temps in the 80's and lows in the 50's. We couldn't have better growing conditions.

This has got to be one of our most mild summers in some time. Yes we hit 100 degrees a couple weeks ago but that was short lived. We have yet to see a trend in the 90's which is very common in July. The course is still looking green. Even though we are still getting cheap water from the creek we are still using it wisely. The fairways are green but they also have some mottling to them. Some areas are browner than green but you won't see a bad lie on the course. The biggest difference this year is the range. It would have normally been turned off two weeks ago and would be as brown as a wheat field in October. The bountiful water has allowed us to widen our irrigated area which will at least keep those errant drives from rolling too far off line.

We were able to topdress the greens last week and will be fertilizing early this week. We have noticed that they are starting to seal up so we will be aerifying with the bayonet tines later in the week, possibly Tuesday and Wednesday. We will probably split it in to two days and will start early enough that we will not affect the tee sheet. The roller will follow so there will not be any change on the ball roll.

Speaking of blogs, one that I like to follow is by Micah Woods, an OSU grad that received his PhD at Cornell and is now the president and research director at the Asian Turfgrass Center. He often travels and this last week he was at St.Andrews helping with the Open. I thought this post was interesting showing the behind the scenes action. http://www.blog.asianturfgrass.com/

Ball Fields

I stopped by to see George and his crew Friday and they are doing a magnificent job. I saw first hand how appreciative the coaches are and how grateful they are to be playing on such immaculate surfaces. His outfields would rival turf at most golf courses and the infields were groomed perfectly. In the photo to the left George is watering the infield to settle the dust before he lets the teams take the field. Below the guys are laying down the foul line and batters box. These guys take a lot of pride in their work and it shows in what they do.