Rolling Road GC Golf Course Management

  Another beautiful week at the Road.  For the last full week of August I am very proud of the course and our team.  It has been a long season with lots of ups and downs.  The crew has been grinding week in and week out and, just like our grass, this time of year we are all a little on the tired side.   We started off this week spraying all surfaces with wetting agent to help with the low humidity and the drier weather.  We have noticed this year that it has been tough to properly wet the soil, most likely due to the drought this spring.  Applying wetting agents help.  Wetting agents are not a cure-all but will get us through drier times.   Speaking of the drought earlier, I know it might not seem like it but we are officially back on the drought map.  We are currently 5 inches below average for the year and 1.5 inches below average for the month.  The combination of drier conditions and grass that is at the end of a long season, it has been a tough balancing act when it comes to moist

  It has been a great week of weather.  We did have a little rain early in the week that was perfect for after aerification.  Our team had a great week, completing all weekly tasks and even dealing with a couple surprises.   Aerification last week was a nice break for the course.  Sand on the greens gave us a break from mowing and rolling but is tough on our Equipment Managers.  Here is Brian and Fernando having to grind mowers over and over again to keep the blades sharp.  Picking up sand on the greens after punching dulls the blades quickly but we need to make sure they stay sharp for a good quality of cut.   The team did have a chance to work on the Bermuda-Grass hitting tee this week.  They laid down over a ton of sand after a verti-cut and brushed the sand in.  This will continue to help with texture and firmness.   The first round of herbicide applications in the new native areas started kicking in this week.  We have one more application to apply next week before seeding.  Pleas

Well, it has been a busy couple of weeks since the last time I updated the blog.  We had all the weather you can have the last couple weeks.  Close to record high temps, dry, windy, stormy and cool.  The team accomplished plenty fighting through all the curve balls mother nature threw at us.   During the heat the team was faced with watering day in and day out.  Water management is tough when temperatures climb into the upper 90's.  Too much water can cause as many problems as too little.   Carroll Tree Service was finally able to come back out to finish the last of the tree work along the fence on hole 6.  This huge Tulip Poplar was completely rotted and very dangerous because it was overhanging both the 6th green and Rolling Road.   The team did have some irrigation repairs to complete the past few weeks, one of which was underneath the cart path close to the tee box on hole 5.  It has been a quite year with irrigation repairs but it always seems to happen when the temperatures r