AERATION

We are aerating greens this week. We appreciate your cooperation as we carry out this vital cultural practice.

Without bogging you down with the details, greens aeration is one of the most important things we do to provide excellent playing conditions throughout the season.  We take many steps to customize our aeration practices to best benefit our greens and our guests.  We test the physical properties of our greens prior to aeration.  This information tells us how compacted the greens are, how much organic material has built up from root development and thatch accumulation, percolation rates, and many other physical variables that determine the health of our putting greens.

This season we determined that we could use a 1/4" aeration tine on very close spacing and pull a core.  This allows us to displace organic material, reduce thatch, as well as reducing the compaction.  This practice fits our current situation and also has the least amount of impact on the playability of the putting surface. 

GOOSE ROUNDUP

As you all know, the geese are very disruptive on the golf course. They peck holes in the greens and leave droppings everywhere. We were fortunate to utilize the services of Andrew Friesen. Andrew works for the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks. He is a Wildlife Biologist. He tags the geese that he catches, he hauls them far away to a lake where they are encouraged to live in a natural habitat that is not disruptive to people in the city. The tags make it possible for Andrew and his team to monitor the behavior of the birds. This is a safe and responsible way to manage the pests while offering a natural solution for wildlife and game hunters in the future.

DEER CREEK FLOODING

Those of you that are familiar with Deer Creek Golf Club are well aware of our risk of flooding if we receive 1" of rain in less than one hour.  Realistically we can experience many flood events in one season and have for many years.  I appreciate our Members and Guests as they are very understanding and allow us the courtesy to clean up the flood damage and get our property back in the condition that we all expect when we visit Deer Creek Golf Club.  Obviously the flood cleanup demands our labor and financial resources and other areas of the property are neglected for that short period of time.  Typically the flood cleanup takes a few days and then we put our major focus back on golf course conditioning.  This week we still have some tree cleanup to do but we are in fairly good condition going into the weekend.  The details will improve as we move into the weekend and try to get back on schedule. 

Thanks again for your courtesy and cooperation.  I hope you can get out here this weekend to enjoy the great weather.   

DRYING OUT

Sorry for the delay. I had some phone issues and didn't find time to post for a while.

You are well aware of the extremely wet weather pattern we have experienced in this area this spring. June is now here and I fully expect mother nature to balance the law of averages and hit us with a prolonged stretch of dry weather. We fortunately made it through the wet strech without any major damage to the course. We struggled to keep up with the mowing and detail work but we are rapidly catching up now that drier conditions are here.

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PRE EMERGENT FERTILIZER

Now is the time to finish your 2011 spring preemergent fertilizer applications on your lawns. I prefer to use prodiamine (brand name barricade) and another great one is dithiopyr (brand name dimension). Both can be picked up at your local Lesco store. Ask for those active ingredients and they will be happy to show you the selection they have that has those active ingredients in it. The reason I like these products is the weed coverage. We have a broad spectrum of weed pressure in Kansas City and these are the least expensive herbicides that cover the weed pressure. Barricade should be applied by April 15th and Dimension can be applied as late as may 15th. Dimension has some post emergent activity on crabgrass so that is why it can be applied later in the season.

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SOD REPAIR

We are working to repair the damaged areas from the green and bunker project. This is the final stage of the project and we are planning to be finished by the end of the month. The focus of the sod is bunker edges and approaches. 

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ZOYSIA

Our tees and fairways are Zoysia grass. There are pros and cons to any turfgrass variety in the transition zone climate that we have in Kansas City. Zoysia is an excellent playing surface due to the aggressive canopy that the plant naturally provides for a superb playing surface both in season and while dormant. Zoysia performs well in the hot dry summers and recovers well from flooding. The poor qualities that Zoysia possesses is the transition into and out of dormancy. This time of year the Zoysia is waking up but it is very slow to break into full growth and color. We also battle fungal disease during this transition process. Zoysia patch is a large irregular yellow patch of infected turf that we treat with a very expensive fungicide to protect the Zoysia from extensive damage. These areas will completely heal once the growing conditions favor rapid growth and recovery.

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IRRIGATION MAINLINES

We have had a tough spring dealing with our irrigation system. We have many miles of irrigation lines connecting nearly 900 sprinkled heads. We noticed the mainline on hole 6 was exposed due to the creek bank eroding away. We hired an irrigation contractor to repair the mainline and they started on Monday the 28th of March. While they were working on that mainline we had another mainline on hole 11 blow out due to creek bank erosion. All I can say is,"When it rains it pours." We finished 6 and we are now working on 11 and hope to have it completed by Friday.

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GREENS AERATION

We just completed the spring greens aeration process. It all turned out well. We started Sunday night and finished Monday. We like to aerate in the night so we have a minimal impact on available tee times. We used a small aeration tine this year so the greens will heal very quickly. We will start mowing the greens a little shorter next week and gradually adjust cutting height each week until we reach our ultimate cutting height goal in late may.

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17 BRIDGE

We have been working tirelessly to repair the damaged bridge on 17. We had two contractors out here all week last week making the necessary repairs to the bridge. It is now complete as of today and we are happy to offer our customers a better experience as they play our golf course. Thank you for your support and cooperation as we planned and executed this extensive project.

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LANDSCAPE

We are adding mulch to the landscape beds this week. We also added some tulips in some of the club house landscape for early color.

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CART PATH IMPROVEMENTS

We added some width to some of the high traffic cart traffic areas this week. It will add some detail to cart path edges and should clean up these areas.

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DRAINAGE

We are working on a few drainage areas on the course this week.  Nine green left and five green right.  We will install new drainlines in these areas to improve playability and aesthetics.

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FEELS LIKE SPRING

We mowed greens today. We have evaluated greens after the winter and they came out great. There is very little winter damage and we anticipate a nice greenup once the temperatures increase. We are still maintaining a higher mowing height due to the young age of the turf, but we will progressively reduce cutting height as we move through the spring.

Come on out and enjoy some of this fabulous weather.

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EAGLE GOLF 2010 NATIONAL CONFERENCE

I just got home from a week of traveling. The first leg of the journey was a personal vacation with my wonderful wife to Mazatlan Mexico. I returned to the states Tuesday morning to attend the 2011 EAGLE GOLF national conference and award ceremony. I was pleasantly surprised when I was awarded the prestigious award of "Superintendent of the year" for EAGLE. I am very honored to be selected for this. I look foreword to another great year serving EAGLE and my great members and guests at Deer Creek Golf Club.

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GET THE CLUBS OUT

We have been shoveling, blowing, and cleaning the course all week. We are going to open the course tomorrow. There are a few holes that will have snow on them, but we are going to allow play while the snow is melting.

We will be confined to the cart path due to the wet conditions so please work with us. We want to keep the course in good condition while we are enjoying some winter golf.

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THE MELTING HAS BEGUN

The forecast looks awesome and we are anticipating a rush of customers as soon as this snow melts away. We anticipate a rapid snow melt if the forecasters are correct. We will shovel snow in the shady areas and do our best to speed up the melting process. The photo included was taken at 1:30p.m. today so you can see we have a ways to go, but we remain optimistic that we will be playing golf next week.

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TREE REMOVAL 10 CREEK

We utilized the small break in the weather to complete the tree removal on hole 10 this morning. Arbor Masters brought out a track hoe and removed the remaining root ball. We are happy to have this project done before the spring rains start flowing down the creek.

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MORE SNOW

This week came and went and we are left with an additional 7" of snow at Deer Creek.  We obviously spent most of the week removing snow and making sure our property is safe for our customers.  We are still working on the golf cart fleet repairing any broken components and most importantly we are evaluating the batteries and replacing any of the weak batteries to ensure a trouble free round of golf when this snow melts away.

COLD TEMPERATURES AND SNOW

What does the recent change in weather mean for the golf course?  The recent snow is a welcomed form of moisture for our extremely dry soil conditions.  We were over 4" below normal rainfall since October prior to this snow event.  The snow can have a negative impact on the turf if the snow cover remains for a long period of time.  Snow mold can injure turf if the conditions are right.  We see the most snow mold injury in this region in the late winter months, February and March, when the soil temperatures are starting to rise and the frost is leaving the soil.  We protect our greens with a preventative snow mold fungicide application so we will be fine on the putting greens.   

Far more dangerous is the cold windy conditions that we have experienced of late.  Fortunately the snow has acted as a blanket for the turf protecting it from the harsh extremely cold wind.  The snow will melt and slowly replenish the soils with some moisture.

I heard that we will have melting temperatures in the near future from a weather forecaster this morning.  Hand in there and don't put your golf clubs too far back in the closet.   

BLIZZARD

The snow is falling at Deer Creek. We are plowing snow for the clubhouse events. We needed the moisture, but not necessarily in the form of heavy snow accumulation. You all know how this works, it will melt and we will be back on the course soon. This does stop our bunker project. Once the snow melts we will be hauling sand again.

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Tree removal from the creek on 10

We removed the tree from the creek by 10 green just before the holiday break. Thank you to the team from Arbor Masters, they are awesome. We took advantage of having the professional arborists on site and we had them clear some branches from 7 and 9 tees.

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New Greens At Deer Creek

We are enjoying some winter golf and enjoying our new greens at Deer Creek Golf Club.  As you all know we are not finished with our greens.  We are still maintaining the greens at an increased mowing height.  This decision is in the best interest of our long term goals of increasing greens speed and putting quality as we progress through the 2011 season.  We want to gradually decrease the mowing height so the greens can mature properly resulting in a lush putting surface that is smooth and quick. 

One of the most important things we can all do to help protect our new greens is to properly repair our ball marks.  Please watch the attached video to see an example of the proper way to repair a ball mark. 

"Two-four-six-eight, We can winter desiccate!"

Megan Kennelly is a researcher for Kansas State Univerity and she offers wonderful timely links to relevent subjects that pertain to the turf industry. 

Please read her current post at the following link. "Two-four-six-eight, We can winter desiccate!"

BUNKER PROJECT PROGRESS

We are renovating all of the green side bunkers at Deer Creek.  We start by removing all of the sand and drainage in the bunkers.  We then install new liner in the bunker.  Finally we add new drainage and sand resulting in a new sand bunker that will play awesome and drain well for years to come.

We currently have all of the green side traps excavated and liner installed.  We are now in the finishing stages of the project where we are installing the new sand.  We currently have 30% of the bunkers filled with sand.  We plan to complete the remaining 70% by Feb. 15, 2011.

We are in the process of preparing our golf cart fleet for the 2011 golf season.  We will service the batteries and complete a service checklist for all of our golf carts.  We plan to service approximately 10 cart per week until the entire fleet is ready to go.

Brent Stephenson Golf Course Superintendent

I am the creater of this blog and I will be posting periodic updates to inform followers of the projects and maintenance projects happening at Deer Creek.