April Color

Tulips in bloom

  The spring annuals are in full swing at WHCC. The daffodils are in full bloom, the tulips are putting on flowers, and the pots and window boxes are filled with pansies, tulips, and hyacinths. Many flowering trees and shrubs are in full spring color, such as, magnolias, redbuds, pears, serviceberries, and viburnums.  As the temperature warms many other plants will put on blooms and it is looking like the tulips will be in full bloom for Easter Sunday.

 

Daffodils in full bloom

Pansies, hyacinths (good fragrance), and tulips in pots

Appalachian Red Redbud behind #9 green

Lavender Twist Redbud

Tulips starting to bloom

Saucer Magnolia in bloom

Star Magnolia in bloom

White daffodils

 
  Many of you may have noticed the new landscape bed we put in behind #11 green. The plants included in this design are an autumn brilliance serviceberry tree, mini mauvette hydrangeas, Blazing star kobold, coreopsis 'zagreb', and karl foerster feather reed grass. The serviceberry is currently in full bloom, but all the other shrubs and perennials are just coming out of winter dormancy. They should fill in nicely in the upcoming months.

New landscape bed #11 green

  On the turf side, much of the cool season grass is exploding out of its winter dormancy. However as the grass grows so does the springtime weeds. Some of these weeds include dandelions, purple deadnettle, chickweed and violet. One of the most invasive spring weeds is lesser celandine. It is a short lived perennial that is on the rise in our area. It is a non native plant brought here from Europe in the 1800s. It blooms in the spring, then dies down to the ground in the summer and returns the following spring as an expanded colony. It forms a dense mat that chokes out many of our native woodland plants. We are currently making herbicide applications to eliminate this weed and the other springtime weeds that invade the golf course.

Lesser celandine in the woods by 4 tee

Dandelions 

  Another one of our "favorite" turfgrass weeds is putting on seed heads and is easy to spot this time of year. Poa annua (annual bluegrass)  is spread all throughout the golf course and is much more difficult to control then the other broadleaf weeds. It is a winter annual that puts out seed in the spring, dies in the heat of the summer, and germinates again in the cooler temperatures of autumn. It differs from kentucky bluegrass by its lighter green color and has a light color ligule. We do use some chemicals to suppress its growth but it is very difficult to fully eradicate. I am sure I will have more to say about this plant during the summer months.

Poa annua seed heads

Poa annua and Kentucky bluegrass seed heads mixed together

   Some areas of the course were torn up because of wear and tear or because of the late season ice storm with the subsequent cleanup work. Over the last couple of weeks a repair crew has laid down new fescue sod in many of these areas and in some of the stump hole areas.

Fescue sod added around #18 bunker face

    The irrigation system is now up and running. To accomplish this we had to turn on the main valve, pressurize the pumps and the system to get up to 100 psi, and bleed out the excess air by turning on each irrigation head. A couple of heads had to be replaced because of bad seals and water pressure damage but now the system is ready to go, once it stops raining.

Spring startup of the irrigation system

 Finally, I wanted to write a little about our greens maintenance program that is under way. We have verticutted the greens. This consists of slicing grooves into the green with a triplex riding mower with a slicing blade attachment. This stimulates turf growth, tightens up the turf, improves smoothness, and opens up the turf's root zone which alleviates some compaction allowing for more nutrient uptake. (for more about verticutting click here) We, also, will be topdressing in the next couple of weeks. This will help smooth out the green, increase green speed, and decrease disease presence.  Fertilization is also imperative for maintaining a healthy green and we will be beginning that process soon with liquid and granular applications.

  This year we will be rolling the greens more often to increase green speed. We have two rollers. A light weight triplex roller and a heavier salco roller. The light weight roller is faster and less impact-full on the turf. It increases the green speed by about a foot. The heavier salsco roller takes more time to use but increases the green speed by about 1.25 feet, and it makes the green faster for a longer period of time. Both of these rollers will be used often during the golf season to maintain a consistent green speed.

Green after veticutting

Light weight roller

Salsco roller

Brad Piecuch
Assistant Superintendent/Horticulturist

Spring has Sprung!

 Spring is starting to show up throughout the golf course. The cool season grasses are doing their part in celebrating St Patrick's day by turning from the brown color of dormancy to bright and dark shades of green. Some of the first flowering trees and shrubs are starting to come into bloom and the spring flowering bulbs are getting ready to put on a show. Growing degree days is how we measure bloom times for plants and we (in western hills) are currently at 65 GDDs. Right now is the time for red maples, forsythia, cornelian cherry dogwoods, and magnolias to start blooming. We are behind the bloom times from the last two years but that is because we had a cooler February and early March then the previous years.The Ohio State University puts out a very informative website to track GDDs for our area and can be accessed by clicking here.

Our neighbors' cornelian cherry dogwoods in bloom 

Red Maple coming into bloom

Tulips appearing in landscape bed

  Spring is a transition time for the grounds department. We finished up the winter tree work which included taking down 12 dying/diseased trees in house and 6 hazardous trees that were taken down by Gregory Forrest Lester. However, the removal of these trees is just the beginning of the process. The leftover stumps have to be ground up, the grindings removed, dirt added, and finally seed and straw put down. We are at the final stages of this process and we should be finished in the coming week. Also, in early March, we were able to get all the bunkers and landscape beds edged with a walk behind edger. This will give the bunkers a nice crisp edge to start off the golf season and will be maintained by trimming on an every other week basis. On the horticulture side, we are beginning to clean out beds, cut down perennials, and mulch all of the clubhouse and golf course landscaping.

First cut in felling red maple on #7 

Filling in stump holes with dirt

Edging on a landscape bed

Bunker before edging

Bunker after edging

  The driving range will be getting some additional mats added and we just finished up the excavation of those areas. The next steps will be to pour the concrete and add the new mats. This should be accomplished by mid April.

Excavating area for mats on the back practice tee

  The mowing operation has begun and will be picking up steam in the next couple of weeks. The greens have been rolled and mowed three times and the first mowing of the fairways has been concluded. Next up will be tees, approaches, and finally rough. The green's height of cut will be slowly lowered as the ground temperature begins to warm up to optimal growing conditions. This along with increased mowing, rolling, and topdressing should allow us to pick up the green speeds to our desired stimpmeter readings by May.

First cut on #3 green

First cut on #6 fairway

  Finally, as many of you already know, Delhi Hills golf course has seen its last days. We have taken advantage of the course's final hours and have been able to cut out bentgrass sod from the 9th green. Bentgrass sod is difficult to obtain in our area with the closest distributor residing in Pittsburgh. The sod will be used for touching up bad areas on our practice tees and replenishing the bentgrass nursery on the driving range. So in a small way the Delhi course will live on at WHCC for years to come!

Delhi Hills Golf Course #9 green

The beginnings of our tee/fairway bentgrass nursery

New bentgrass sod added to far practice tee

Brad Piecuch

Assistant Superintendent/Horticulturist

February update

   We survived the Polar Vortex! We dropped down to -7 F at our weather station. This almost certainly will be the lowest temperature for the winter this year and it is above our threshold of -10 F for zone 6. However, it is close enough that we may have some damage on tender plants for this region such as southern magnolias, crape myrtles, azaleas, and butterfly bushes. Only time will tell.
 
   Despite the recent winter weather, the grounds department has remained busy with winter projects. Tree work is going along smoothly, with most of the dead/dying trees scheduled to be removed already cut down. Many of these dying trees were Austrian pines and Scots pines that have been infected with a fungal disease called diplodia tip blight. These two trees are the most susceptible hosts to this disease. The disease starts at the tips of the branches of these evergreens with the needles turning brown. It quickly spreads to the rest of the plant, especially during wet weather, and eventually kills the entire tree. There are now only a few of these pines left on the course and they all will eventually succumb to this disease. During the recent cold snap, three pin oak trees on the right side of 7 fwy were taken down (by Gregory Forrest Lester) as well as an ash tree on the right side of 1 fwy that had the emerald ash borer. The pin oaks on 7 fwy had much damage from the recent ice storm; one also had damage from a lighting strike, and two out of the three trees were starting to encroach into the fairway. The tree company also pruned low branches and dead limbs out of 10 pin oaks located throughout the course.

Pine tree with early onset of diplodia tip blight (photo from another course)

cutting down dying black locust tree

Internal decaying problem indicated by mushroom growth on the trunk

Pin oaks removed by 7 fwy left us with a lot of cleanup work

   Pruning of dead and low lying limbs has also taken place throughout this winter. Many of our white pine trees have a significant amount of dead stubs that we have been pruning out. Other projects that we have been working on include: widening of the cart path by 4 tee, attending turf seminars, course cleanup, making instant programs on the lynx irrigation system to help with watering efficiency, seasonal staff recruitment, and beginning to dormant seed areas of the rough.

white pines by #4 tee limbed up for foot traffic and better sunlight exposure for the turf by 3 cart path

cart path expanded by #4 tee. black top to be added when warmer

white pines on #7, stubs pruned out

Tri-state Green Industry Expo trade show

Tri- state Green Industry Expo seminar

Instant fairway program for dry spots on toro lynx

   As we enter the last leg of winter and into early spring, I think it is important to touch base on winter play and course conditions. There are four main reasons why the course may be closed or delayed during the winter months. They are frost, frozen ground, thawing ground, and very wet conditions. Frost and frozen ground can cause significant damage to the turf when walked or driven on. Thawing ground can cause root damage from foot traffic when the top layer of the soil is thawed and the lower layer is still frozen. Any traffic during this scenario will break the roots in between the two layers. Wet ground is much more common this time of year from heavy rainfall, low evapotranspiration rates, and the dormancy of the turf. (prohibiting any water uptake). Walking on highly saturated soil will cause deep footprints that will create craters and unevenness especially prevalent on putting greens. For more information on winter play click on this informative article by the USGA .

Cart traffic damage from driving over frozen turf

Ball marks slow to heal during bentgrass winter dormancy

Brad Piecuch

Assistant Superintendent/Horticulturist

Winter is Back!

   We need to make a new adage for the month of January; in like a lamb and out like a lion! The end of December and the first part of January were well above normal causing us to mow greens, tees and fairways into January. The warm weather allowed us to get many other projects accomplished that would not be able to get done if the ground was frozen or snow covered. Some of these included drainage work in low wet areas, drainage work in bunkers that hold water, finishing leaf cleanup, and starting to take down dead trees and pruning low branches.

Mowing fairways on January 7th!

                                   

Tree pruning. Low branches on #1

  Since the second week of January winter has showed up and we have started on winter jobs. One of our main priorities in the winter months is to keep the parking lot free of snow and ice. Our equipment was given a good test last weekend with old man winter dumping around 6" of snow on the course. The new bobcat that was purchased in the fall was able to plow the deep snow with ease and helped us to be more efficient in our snow plowing operation. Other winter jobs that will be accomplished in the coming months will be pesticide record updates, working on equipment, doing landscape designs, the sanding and painting of some golf course accessories, staff recruitment, tree work (weather permitting), and the attendance of turf and horticulture seminars. I was fortunate enough to attend the Indiana Green Expo conference in Indianapolis and learned a lot of new turf and horticulture information as well as earning pesticide credits.

Snow plowing lot with bobcat

Indiana Green Expo turf seminar

 

Landscape design behind #11 green

                                                     

Cutting down dying oak tree

   The new snow might not be great to drive in, but it sure does change the landscape of the golf course into a winter wonderland!

             Winter Pictures of the Golf Course

  Brad Piecuch
Assistant Superintendent/Horticulturist

Early Winter Update

 Even though the calendar and thermometer are looking more like winter, fall is still hanging on. The oak trees are still holding on to many of their leaves (called marcescent foliage) and are slowly letting them go. This, coupled with the November ice storm cleanup, has gotten us behind on leaf removal. Now that the ice damage is cleared we are all hands, and mowers, on deck for leaf cleanup. There are many areas where the leaves are pilled up so high, and the ground is so wet, that we have to manually remove them instead of chopping them with the mowers. However, we are making progress and, weather permitting, we should have most of the areas cleaned up in the next couple of weeks. Also, the ice storm has left us with a lot of firewood and if anyone is interested, in free firewood, we have it stacked by the grounds building on #18 cart path.

Manual removal of a leaf pile

Oaks with marcescent foliage

Our new Bobcat helping us with debris/leaf removal

Free firewood 

 We were, also, able to get the irrigation system winterized earlier this month. Blowing out the system is a necessity for the winter so that we do not have any pipes that freeze and crack and leave us with a big problem when we need the water in the spring. This was accomplished with the help of Leibold irrigation who hooked up an air compressor to our pump station and we were then able to manually blow out each individual head on the course and winterize the pump station.

Blowing out irrigation heads

  On the equipment side, our head mechanic Jim Hessel and the assistant mechanics, are hard at work beginning to get the annual winter maintenance on all our equipment underway. There is a different degree of maintenance required for different units depending upon their usage. Some of this maintenance includes:

• The grinding/sharpening of all the walking and riding reel mowers
• Rebuilding the bearings and seals on all of the reel mowers
• Grinding of bednives to aid in the reel-to-bednife relationship to achieve optimal mowing results
• Pressure washing of all the grounds equipment
• Greasing of all the mowers
• Oil changes on all riding equipment

All of this winter mechanical maintenance takes the majority of the winter months to accomplish and is a crucial part in maintaining a quality golf course.

Walking greens mower on the Accu-Pro grinding machine

  Once the leaf removal is accomplished we will begin our winter projects such as tree pruning/removal, new landscape bed designs, bunker drainage work, snow removal on the parking lot as needed, and attending horticulture/turf seminars to keep up to date with education credits and the new technology/ideas of industry professionals.

On behalf of everyone on the Grounds Crew, we would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Brad Piecuch

Assistant Superintendent/Horticulturist