GREENS

12 GREEN SUFFERS ANOTHER SET BACK

There are two very unique characteristics of the 12th green we don't currently have with any other green on the property. One is the lack of air movement. Even with all the trees we removed during the renovation, there is still no air movement around this green. We can all feel it as we stand on this green and it is easily measured. The temperature at the canopy on the 12th green was recorded at 41.6 degrees C at 10:30 am today. 41.6, that's 107 on the old scale. And in Alabama and Florida where they get 107 degrees, they don't grow bent grass. They grow bermuda grass, because bent does not do well at 107 degrees!



So why do we have 17 awesome greens, and number 12? Well, this is the real problem, and we have talked about it before. The 12th green has an organic layer on the top 2.5 centimeter of the soil which acts like a sponge and holds water, suffocating the grass plant. Looking at the green from a short distance some people might think it needs more water because of the colour of it. In actual fact there is too much water being held at the top of the soil. Adding more water is the worst thing we could do.

Look at this picture.

What do you notice?

This is a plug pulled from 12 green at about 2pm today.

The top 2.5 centimeters has an obvious black layer. This is the organic layer. It's black because it's anaerobic! We may have other greens that hit 107 degrees, but they can breathe because there is no layer. And if we put some water on them to help cool them down, the water can percolate through the root zone. The 12th green on the other hand holds water around the crown of the plant preventing it from getting the oxygen the plant requires.

Last year we filled this green with holes and the green recovered. This spring we made the perfect plans for the continued aerification to prevent this issue. But the weather during the scheduled aerification was extremely hot and we had to cancel or we would have had 18 greens which we would not be able to keep moist and cool and would have lost significant grass on these green surfaces. The 12th green has been opened up regularly with a small solid tine, and with a slicer to help get oxygen to the roots all this year, but this only helped in a minor way, the extreme heat was too much for some of the plants.

So what are we doing about it? In the immediate short term we are using very light misting of water to help cool the plants. We are also using a blower to blow air over the green surface. These two practices have helped us bring the temperatures down, but it does nothing for the organic layer. As painful as it is we must start pulling a core on a regular bases from this green to physically remove this layer. The misting I mentioned is just a very small amount of water just enough to hit the leaves and then evaporate, which dissipates heat. Much like we might splash a little water on our faces to cool down.

The best thing in the short term is if "Large Marge" could bring the heat down for us.