Spring Creek November Newsletter 19 P4_SPC81715 November Newsletter | Page 8

letter from the superintendent October has been a busy month for the agronomy team, with a busy tournament schedule as well as dealing with a significant drought for this time of the year. There are areas of the course that are showing signs of drought stress. These areas, which turn an off-color green to brown, are what we call localized dry spots. Localized dry spots develop when the soil becomes water repellent, which means water cannot penetrate the turf to wet the soil and roots. Although brown spots that develop because of localized dry spots can be unsightly, rest assured playing conditions can still be great because dry turf plays firmer than wet turf. To alleviate these water-repellant conditions, wetting agents are applied to allow water to penetrate the soil. We apply these wetting agents to the fairways on a 3-week interval during the golf season. However, wetting agents alone are not enough to prevent localized dry spots. We are continuously training our agronomy team to identify these areas by using a soil probe to see how dry the soil is. Once a dry area is located, the crew member will have to heavily hand water the area. Hand watering is neither fun for the crew member or for the golfer, mainly because hand watering is very labor intensive, and we can only hand water during play, which can be a distraction for the golfer. Our team does greatly appreciate your playing around us and making sure we are paying attention before you hit your next shot. With these cooler temperatures at night and due to drought conditions, the turf has finally begun to slow down on growing, allowing the agronomy team to work on other projects around the course. The first area we are working on is repairing the collars from drought stress and the dreaded Annual Blue Grass Weevil, which is making its way into hibernation for the Fall. As you may have noticed, we are using the turf from 2 Fairway to repair these damaged areas. That area we are shrinking will be seeded and converted to fescue rough. As we finish with the collars, we will begin moving on to fairways, followed by the teeing surfaces, starting with Tee #14. Thank you, Ryan Holbrook Golf Course Superintendent 8 | November 2019