Memorial Day Weekend 2020
Here is your spring 2020 summary picture. Cool season grass enjoyed itself and the bermuda did nothing. This will change shortly.
This May has been cooler than last years April. We went from being a month ahead in March to being a month behind in May!
22 more pallets of Latitude sod was laid on Monday this week. This will be the last installment of sod for a few weeks while we wait for Mother Nature to do her part to help fill in many of these other dormant areas on the Manakin.
Our season long slow release fertilizer was applied this week on the Manakin. This application will be the base for our growing season. We can add on where necessary as the year moves on. The Sabot will receive the same application in a week or two. We are thankful to bring on 6 more people in June to help us keep up with a normal mowing schedule as things warm up.
Gypsum was applied to all the new tees on the Manakin this week. The tees were also solid tine aerated and will be sand topdressed next week. We know these new tees firm up quickly when things dry out. We need to produce our own organic matter through the growing season to help loosen them up so we can get the markers in the ground and you can get a tee in the ground.
The greens have thoroughly enjoyed the spring weather and are in great shape. We have one last piece of the puzzle to fit in to secure our greens health for the summer. During aeration back in March we skipped the Dryject process on the Manakin greens. We are re-inserting this process on Wednesday June 3rd. The Manakin will be closed all day while we inject about 30 tons of sand into the greens profile. We will also pull tiny 1/4" diameter cores out of the greens. The greens will be blown off, brushed clean and rolled in order to be put back into play on Thursday the 4th. Healing will take place quickly and we will not be aerating these greens again until late October.
One form of aeration that we don't need is the digging of giant holes with your 7 iron on the driving range. We have both bluegrass and bermudgrass working on the range tee now but areas like this will take all season to recover. Please leave a few inches in between lines of divots and work from the front to the back to minimize impact. Check out the USGA article on divots here.
Just in case it does finally get hot this summer we have 6 new fans on site ready to keep our bentgrass cool. The new fans will be installed on 2 Sabot and 3, 4, 5, 12 and 13 Manakin. These new fans were our #1 priority on this years capital improvements plan. We have the wire in the ground already, we are only waiting for Dominion to finish up their power meters in early June before we can get the air moving across the greens surface.
Jacob is helping us stay disinfected with a backpack fogger. Stay safe and enjoy your long weekend!