Cooler Week Ahead

We have had some outstanding grass growing weather over the last week or so. Temperatures have been in the 80's and the low temperatures at night have been in the 50's and 60's which makes for some outstanding growing conditions. It looks like this week however is going to be a bit cooler with temperatures in the 70's and 60's for highs. The greens have continued to grow and heal well from the spring aerification. It has been a painfully slower process then in previous years but I feel that they are just about 100% healed and ready for the meat of our golf calendar that is coming up. Since they have finally healed we were able to apply our first round of growth regulator on them last week to help slow down their growth which should help keep the green speeds more consistent through out the day. The growth regulator should kick in by the middle of week just in time for the weekend. Today we also did our first venting with the pencil tines on the back nine greens. We do this to help keep the compaction layer from forming from all the mowing, rolling, and foot traffic but also it helps the oxygen, water, and nutrients get down to the roots of the plant, which helps keep our root system healthy. This practice is really important and is one that we can do without disrupting to much of the putting green surface all the while getting a huge benefit of our turf. I have attached a couple of pictures to help show you what the machine we do this with looks like and what the greens look like after it is done. Just a reminder that tomorrow is our day off on the greens. We will not be mowing or rolling them. However we will be doing the venting on the front nine greens along with topdressing, and fertilizing all the greens with a silicon product that helps with plant health. Our zoysia areas continue to improve in the areas that are slow to green up. We have been replacing the areas that I didn't think would recover but I am encouraged by a lot of the other areas and am going to stay patient as long as I can to let it come back. Have a great week!!