The Problems with our Greens
Superintendent Tony and his team have been dealing with a series of problems over the last three months that started with grooming of the greens in late January. The older greens suffered and took some time to recover but disease also entered the picture possibly brought on by the heavy unseasonal rain in January and subsequent high humidity. Tony brought that under control with two fungicide sprays. At around the same time the greens were treated with the chemical Tupersan which is used to control couch encroaching on the greens. However this turned out be a faulty batch of chemical and instead of killing the couch and not harming the bent grass, the reverse occurred. This was a manufacturing fault and not a staff error. This accounts for a lot of the problem being around the fringes of the greens. Perhaps because of this, it disguised a more insidious problem and that is black layer that every golf course has to deal with. It is caused by lack of aeration that encourages anaerobic bacteria. One of the factors contributing to black layer is compaction from rolling the greens. These bacteria form sulphides that are toxic and kill the root system and if nothing is done, the whole plant dies. That is the reason for coring the greens – to aerate the greens. Treatment should have already occurred but it was decided to leave it till after the Autumn Cup
The team has turfed out big areas with Pencross bent grass generously provided by Michael Dennis from RPGC. Other areas have been plugged out.
Tony is happy with the recovery to date and the greens should be back to normal with the cooler weather coming on but a further concern with longer term effects, is tree shading. This is affecting the right front of the 6th green and the left front of the 8th green.
Black layer 3rd green
Faulty chemical damage 6th green
