Hermitage CC Golf Course Management

 Well...Happy 4th! Summer has officially arrived! Temperatures climbed over 100 degrees this week...all of us are cranky and already talking about hunting season, fall vacations, and those first frosts. We wouldn't have it any other way. This dangerous heat was followed by some much-needed rainfall and, of course, extreme humidity. That's exactly what the Bermudagrass has been waiting for. While this weather is great for Bermuda, the next two to three weeks are survival mode for our bentgrass greens. One of the biggest tools we have at our disposal during this time of year is air movement. My phone this week was filled with pictures of fan components that were absolutely smoked by the intense lightning storms. Most of the fans on the golf course were damaged in some capacity, but the boys did a great job getting them back up and running in a hurry. Those fans become extremely important this time of year as we do everything we can to help the bentgrass survive the heat. Speaking...

 This week started with a helicopter on the range to lift new AC units onto the roof of the clubhouse. They wouldn't let us drive the helicopter, so we started prepping the golf course for battle this week. Scheduled fungicide, nutrient, and wetting agent applications were made on Monday to both golf courses to ensure all the necessary plant protectants were in place to get ready for what has proved to be a tough Fourth of July week. Today was absolutely brutal, but tomorrow has the potential to be straight-up dangerous. The heat index is forecast to be above 110 tomorrow. We will be babysitting bentgrass for the next couple of days. We pride ourselves on absolute top-level conditions, and very rarely do we give ourselves a pass on green speeds, but this week we're taking that pass. The name of the game this week is plant health and survivability. The greens early this week were as slow as they have been all year. When it gets this hot and humid, the plant gets puffy, fat, and ...

 This week has really been our advance week for the arrival of the true Virginia summer we knew would be here before long. Monday marked a very exciting day for the maintenance team—it was the last Monday outing for a couple of weeks! We have a regular maintenance Monday this coming week, followed by Sabot verticutting and topdressing, an outing on July 13, and then a break from outings until mid-August. Before Monday's outing, we were able to complete a lot of prep work for the heart of the summer season. The greens were lightly topdressed, followed by a foundational nutrition package of calcium (Ca) and potassium (K). These nutrients help strengthen the plant's cell walls and aid in stress recovery—two things that are essential for maintaining quality playing conditions throughout the heat of the summer. The greens were a little softer and slower than they've been in some time, but this is an acceptable byproduct of the much-needed rainfall we received early this week. To...

The weather finally delivered some much-needed rainfall this past weekend, followed immediately by the heat and humidity that Bermudagrass loves. The response on both courses has been noticeable. The Bermuda is showing its appreciation, and many of the areas we've been working so hard to encourage are really starting to dial in. As the Bermuda continues to gain strength, one of our primary areas of focus over the coming weeks will be the green collars. These areas remain some of the most challenging turf on the entire golf course. We are essentially managing cool-season bentgrass greens surrounded by warm-season Bermudagrass collars, which creates a unique set of challenges. Many of the herbicides available to control weeds such as Poa annua and goosegrass have the potential to move or track onto bentgrass putting surfaces. Because of that risk, we are extremely cautious with any herbicide applications made directly adjacent to greens. At times, that means we tolerate a little Poa ...