Golf Maintenance Fall Update

The night time temperatures have cooled off and the Bermuda grass is finally starting to slow down. We still have to mow greens daily but the fairway and tee growth have slowed down enough to allow us to start some of our playability projects and prepare the course for winter.   

The largest item that has really been at the top of our list for the past several months is addressing the greenside bunkers at White Wing. Unfortunately the busy tournament months and no closed days at White Wing in the past two months has made it difficult to schedule any work on the bunkers until this time. On Oct 28th we will be converging all of our efforts on removing approx. three inches of sand out of the greenside bunkers so that we can continue to work on getting the bunkers firmed up. Once we feel we have removed the adequate amount of sand we will be adding another firmer sand type to get them back to the proper depths and consistency.

This month we will also be tackling numerous projects and performing various agronomic practices to get ready for the winter months. The first of these projects will include cart path repairs at Legacy Hills and White Wing, we hope to have these repairs complete by the middle of next week as long as the weather cooperates. We also plan to have a tree company on site this month to address some tree trimming at White Wing that will have an immediate impact on playability.

Other items on our to do list for Oct. include a bulk fertilizer application, course wide pre-emerge applications, overseeding par three tees and overseeding the Driving Range tee tops at all three courses including the landing areas at the Cowan Creek and White Wing ranges.  

 

 

#14 Drainage at White Wing

Earlier this spring one of the first major projects of the year was to have a completely new drainage system installed in front of #14 Green at White Wing. We posted updates of the project on this Blog and included photos of the finished project. Recently we received over four inches of rain in a 24 hour period and we were curious to see how well the drainage held up to that amount of rain. Below is a video of the drainage system at work.

 As you can see the drainage is working as planned and is catching the water and taking it underneath the approach and into the creek along the right side of the #14 hole. We are very pleased with the end result of this work.

Wet Surrounds at White Wing

White Wing Wet Spots

We are encountering a few wet spots around greens and various low spots around the course. The crew and management are in constant communication with each other and continue adjusting water schedules as needed. Sometimes these areas continue to form and warrant more attention to obtain desirable conditions. A few key examples of work in progress and resolving problems are the front of three green and the tee side fairway of #11. Drains were necessary and put in as soon as time allowed. The next two areas on the list are the front of #14 and the front right of #15 greens. The issue at #14 is newer and we have turned off some heads in the area to help alleviate the problem. #15 green also has some heads turned off. #15 has been an ongoing area and we have done some drainage work there in the past. We are going to extend that drainage soon to try and catch some of the water shedding off the green.

In the heat of the summer there is a fine line between not enough and too much. Areas around greens usually are the first to get in these conditions as greens need more attention and also have the most undulation and watershed. We strive to provide the best conditions daily while dealing with Mother Nature and a living, ever changing course.

Jonathan Ayers
Superintendent
White Wing GC

Sun City Golf Club Nursery Green

Nursery Green at White Wing

Those of you who have either played White Wing over the past week or participated in the Open House on Monday probably noticed that we’ve had grounds construction going on between the green on hole number twelve and the tee area of hole number thirteen.  We have had many people stop to inquire about the work and what we are doing there. The answer is that we are building a Nursery Green that can be used by all three of our golf courses.

What is a Nursery Green?

A Nursery Green is a green that is maintained identical to the other greens on the golf course and that can be used for replacement turf on the golf course greens when needed.  In this case our green will be split with two grass variety types. Mini-Verde for Cowan Creek and Legacy Hills and Tif-Eagle for White Wing.

 

Typically, in the past if we had a weak area on a green or a poor section of green due to an unfavorable spring transition we would have to purchase sod to repair these areas. The problem with this is that the sod farms often times cannot cut sod until later in the spring and not necessarily when we need it. Having our own grass on site will insure that repairs are made more quickly and that we save money on the sod and on the cost of freight to get it delivered.  This nursery green will be a valuable asset to the Sun City Golf Courses.

Utilizing Monday Course Closures

Utilizing Monday Course Closures

Submitted by Craig Loving

The goal of Golf Maintenance is to maintain playable course conditions and healthy turf, working in a way so that we accomplish our routine cultural practices and small- to large-scale projects in a timely manner, without disrupting play. Beginning in 2012, the Sun City Texas golf courses have been on a regular rotation of closing one course each Monday, so that each course is closed once every three weeks. These closings have been beneficial for us to complete necessary tasks in a timely fashion without interfering with golfers’ play. Depending on the time of year and our aerification schedule, the tasks completed during these Mondays differs from week to week. Below is a brief description of how we utilize Monday closings to make improvements on the golf courses.

Aerifications
Greens aerifications are scheduled at each course a minimum of three times annually, and each aerification can differ, depending on the time of the growing season. The process itself is very time consuming and it generally takes a full day of work (up to 12-plus hours) for our crew members to have the greens ready for play the following day.
Fairway aerifications are scheduled twice per year at each course. Although the process isn’t as involved as a greens aerification, this cultural practice takes up to two days to complete due to the acreage involved. Other aerifications, such as tees and high-traffic areas, are done on an as-needed basis, but we generally use our closed Mondays to complete them.

Winter Projects
During the growing season, we devote a majority of our time to mowing and weed-eating, so as to keep the grass in playable areas at a desired height of cut. However, when the grass becomes dormant, we spend our closed days working on winter projects. During this time, we have the ability to utilize crew members from all three golf courses in order to finish each task more rapidly. Some examples of our annual winter projects include: tree trimming at White Wing and Legacy Hills, installing and improving drainage, cutting down salt cedars and willows in the native areas, removing cattails from ponds, checking bunker depths and adding sand to needed areas, irrigation audits and head adjustment, etc. Last winter, we began using our closed Mondays to do winter aerifications on the greens using a needle tine. We came out of dormancy much better than in previous years with these extra needle tine aerifications.

Growing Season Monday Closures
From spring to late fall, we dedicate a majority of our closed Mondays to keeping up with rough mowing. We also utilize this time for flymowing and edging bunker faces, weed-eating specific areas on the course, and edging cart paths, irrigation heads, and yardage markers. All of these tasks take considerably less time to complete without having to stop for golfers. For example, during a closed Monday at Cowan Creek, we can finish mowing rough in 1.5 days, whereas it can take upwards of four (4) days without a closed Monday. Also at Cowan, edging and flymowing bunker faces can be cut down to two (2) days with a closed Monday, but can take over a week to complete without the closing. If we don’t have an aerification scheduled, we generally use the closed days for these kinds of tasks. In the heat of the summer, a closed Monday is also an opportune time to catch up on irrigating hot spots throughout the course. We would normally schedule this task during the early morning in front of play, but, without worrying about play disruption, we can turn on irrigation heads and/or hand-water areas in need during the mornings and evenings.

Overall, our week-to-week tasks on closed Mondays vary between each course, depending on the time of year and what is most important to maintain playable conditions and healthy turf.

July 2013 Course Conditions

We have seen it all this month in terms of weather, we have had our typical 100 degree days and more recently some days that felt like it was February again. The four inches plus of rain that we received early last week came at a great time with the fairways and roughs starting to dry out in certain spots due to the heat and some water rationing done on our part. We are over half way done with the year and have kept pretty close with all of our cultural practices that we have scheduled for the year. The rain last week did push back the White Wing fairway aerification but we will catch that back up once we return to our typical weather pattern for July and August.

In other golf course related news, the CA wood clearing crew came over and cleared out the creek in front of #18 right side tees at White Wing. This helped us out tremendously and we hope to have them back later in the year to finish out that entire section of creek down to the bridge.

This month we also announced the hiring/promotion of Reagan Olson to the Head Superintendent position at Legacy Hills. He has been acting as the interim since April of this year and has already made great improvements to the course conditions at Legacy Hills. We have also filled the position of Assistant Superintendent at Cowan Creek and that individual will be starting at the beginning of August. I will make an announcement via the Golf Communicator and Golf Maint. Blog when he has officially started.

Verti-cutting Greens

If you’ve had a chance to play Cowan Creek this week you may have noticed some areas on the greens that have some small patches of scalped turf. This week we decided to get a bit more aggressive with our verti-cutting so that we could remove more thatch than normal. These areas are where the verti-cutter “pulled” or cut into the grain one way and then the mower cut that grain the opposite direction on the mowing pass. This is a normal occurrence when going this aggressively and the scalped spots will not affect ball roll and will heal very quickly. This process will take place on each of the courses over the next few weeks.

Thatch removal is critical to keeping the turf healthy and to promote growth. It also helps speed the greens up and smooth them out. During a regular play day we would not be able to do this due to the amount of clean-up but on a closed day we have the time to get everything cleaned up once the process is complete.  As you can see from the photo below the amount of thatch removed from just one green was quite a bit. (The hat placed on top is just for size reference, we did not burry any of our employees during the making of this communicator) We will continue to be aggressive with our verti-cutting for the remainder of the growing season and the results in turf quality will be evident both in playability and aesthetically. 

 

2013 Summer Fairway Aerification

2013 Summer Fairway Aerification

 

Submitted by Craig Loving 

            On 7/8/13 we began aerifying the fairways at Cowan Creek.  The following paragraphs and figures will explain the process we used, the difficulties we discovered, an explanation of the need for periodic fairway aerifications.

            The original plan was to pull a core out of the fairways, pulverize the plugs, then drag the plugs back in.  However, in preparation of the process we discovered that the fairways suffered from excessive compaction from cart and machine traffic (as seen in figure A). 

(180 lbs without being able to force the probe through the root zone) 

            We had difficulty using a hollow tine to pull cores at a sufficient depth, and some of the tines broke during the trial process.  We made an adjustment to our game plan and used a shatter tine on an Aerway ™ aerifier (Figure B and C).  The shatter tine allowed us to break through the turf and the rootzone to a depth up to 6” in the soil.  A key benefit to using a shatter tine as opposed to a regular slicer is the offset setup of the tines, leaning them away from the vertical line (Figure B).  As the tine exits the ground, it moves the soil laterally and fluffs the soil to decrease compaction. 

             Similar to greens aerifications, this practice increases water infiltration and allows air to move into the soil profile.  In turn, this will promote a healthier root system which will benefit overall turf quality and color.  Below are photos of the fairway appearance after aerifying with the Aerway ™ using shatter tines (Figure D & E). 

            Although great for long-term health of the turf, the temporary negative effects of this process are evident for several days.  The shatter tine leaves a 4-5” slit in the turf (Figure F), and the turf is lifted up one side upon exit.  This causes the aerified areas to be bumpy.  We are currently using a pull-behind drum roller to smooth out the tufted areas (Figure G), and over time this practice along with general cart traffic will return the fairways back to normal. 

            Both White Wing and Legacy Hills are scheduled for fairway aerifications in the upcoming weeks. We will continue this (as well as pulling cores) in the future to alleviate our compaction issues.  These practices in conjunction with flushing and fertilizer amendments will help us maintain the best playing conditions over a long period of time.

Cart Traffic Control

While out riding the course last week I noticed numerous areas were the 90 Degree rule is not being followed. This results in more wear areas on the course, especially between the cart path and fairways. Due to this heavy type of wear, especially on certain holes, this month we will be starting a rotation of Cart Path Only holes between #1 and #9 at Legacy Hills to help alleviate some of the cart traffic wear on those two holes. Below I have attached a photo taken from just a few yards in front of the tee boxes on #6 at Legacy Hills, as you can see there is a heavy wear pattern that has formed and we will have to install more rope and stakes to remedy this problem. The more areas like this that we have, the more rope and stakes we have to put out on the course. I myself am not a big fan of this and would love to see us use less rope on the course altogether. So please try to use the 90 Degree Rule as much as possible and remind the fellow players in your group as well, it can only help the conditions of the course get better. Thank you!

 

Level 3 Mowing Update

Prepared by:

Catrin Dubois

Landscape Superintendent

Sun City Texas Community Association

 

L3 Mow Update:

 

The contractor in charge of mowing the fuel breaks behind the property lines is scheduled to start on Monday, June 17^th. The mowers will be directed to start in NH 40 and then move to native areas that are heavily shaded ( yes we actually have these in Sun City) and have hardly any wild flowers. Most of our flowers are seeding but some have just started blooming. Cardinal flower and Liatris are a little late this year thanks to the cooler temps in April and spring rain fall.

We anticipate completing all native areas within 40 working days, weather permitting.

Frequently asked questions:

The mowers are mowing high and are not picking up the clippings

The mowing does not look manicured

The crew did not trim dead branches form trees

The scope of work: Mowing height is set at 4” to 6” to protect all native vegetation which are the wild flowers and native grasses. Consistent short mowing of the natives would result in erosion.

A 10’ to 30’ strip behind the homes is mowed to reduce the fuel load in case of a grass fire. Even though so vegetation may look like a fire hazard we evaluate the fuel content. The left behind clippings do not pose a fire hazard to the homes in Sun City.

The contract does not include tree trimming or dead wood removal. The Level 3 common areas are for the most part drainage easements which means they are designed to move run off during rain events. Even though the native areas are referred to as green belts the landscape department considers them fuel breaks and drainage easements.

Large flat areas are mowed with a tractor and shredder attachment and riding mowers are used in the smaller common areas. Sometimes clippings may fall along property lines.

Ornamental items: As per the Sun City CC&Rs no one except the developer or the CA should alter any common areas which includes placing items in the native areas. The mow crews are not liable for any damages to such items as bird baths, plantings, compost bins, gazing balls, benches, bird feeders, bird houses etc that may get damaged during the cutting of the fuel breaks. Please look behind your lot and remove any such items that may have appeared

Wild Life: Fawns are being placed by their mothers in the tall grasses and will stay put until mom returns. The mowing crew is instructed to watch out for baby deer and to skip the area where a deer has been left behind. During heavy drought years we noticed that the native Cotton rats moved closer to residential lots to access available water sources. Expect to see some rodent activity during the mowing efforts. The animals are moving out of the way of the blades and find their way back to the native common areas. Another reason to keep the mowing height at 4” – 6” is the preservation of habitat for reptiles, rodents and ground nesting birds. Snake sightings may also increase during the mowing. Living in Texas one should always be on the lookout for snakes and should be able to recognize the most common non- venomous Texas Rat Snake which can be quite intimidating because of its size but very harmless. Rattlesnake sightings have been reported this Spring and are part of our landscapes. Copperheads have never been sighted in Sun City same as the Cottonmouth. With grandkids visiting please be sure to keep them from exploring the native common areas and remind them to pay special attention while walking the nature trails and to admire snakes from a distance.

Expect weekly email updates from the landscape department in regards to the mow schedule. If you have questions please send an email to catrin.dubois@scteaxs.org and copy your neighborhood rep or the alternate. This way we can speed up communications to the whole neighborhood with the answers.