Today The Practice Opens

Finally you get the chance to hit some golf balls here at Avondale today ... be at the practice only.  We finished setting the practice area up yesterday and continue to work on the golf course to get it ready for Friday's opening.

Almost all of the golf course supplies are on the golf course and today we will finish roping the F9 as well as mark the areas that are GUR ... yes Mr. Bentzen, I marked the golf course GUR areas.  Due to the pythium the rule will be lift, clean and place until we can get all of the reseeding to germinate.

Tomorrow the Practice Opens

We are doing the final prep work today to get the practice area ready to open tomorrow morning.  The CG & the PG are ready and in pretty good shape for the opening, but we still be doing some minor repair on them in the upcoming weeks.

Yesterday, we re-seeded the bad areas on the back nine and today we will be working on the front nine.  As I had the discussion with my team today again please remember to save the young and tender seedling by scattering your cart traffic.

Seeding

We just purchased more Poa Triv to be able to continue to seed and improve the Pythium infected greens.  Basically, everyday we are spot seeding the few remaining damaged greens.  Now with the roads finished around Avondale our focus will to germinate this seed before opening next Friday.

There is still lots to do before opening this upcoming Friday the 4th of Nov. and the team is focused on getting everything ready for that day.  Between being shorthanded and having five to seven days less than normal our maintenance team is on the right path and has been working extremely hard to get everything done.  Trust me ... it is quite a lot.

13's Green on 10-24-11

13's Green on 10-30-11

Vast Improvements

Back of 12's Green -- Improve in Past 3

With the weather improving we are starting to see re-growth in the weaken areas that were hit by the Pythium.  Over the past week we have added an additional 500 lbs of ryegrass seed to the fairways, 250 lbs of seed to the tees and other weakened areas, and have been re-seeding and lightly topdressing the damaged greens.  All of this hard work has been paying off and we will continue to improve over the upcoming couple of weeks.

13's Green of Right Side -- 50% Improvement from 3 Days Ago

It is Getting Better

The weather is cooling down and the hard work is starting to pay off ... the greens are improving.  Still lots of work to do but we are going down the right road now.  The fairways and tees have had their additional seed added and we should see improvement there soon.

It has been a tough year in the Valley with some losing their entire crop of seed.  So far we have been damaged but much less than others.  We have a week and a day before we open which we will spend a great deal of effort working on repairing any damage remaining.

The Wind Continues

All I wanted was a slight breeze and lower temperatures ... well I am getting 10 - 20 mph that are drying out the course alright but with the streets being done may lead to some more issues that we will have to deal with. 

We continuing to be aggressive with the greens repair and will continue to progress with the long list of things that need to be done before we open.  The good news is that the streets will be done this weekend and we can get back to unimpeded work.

Windy Conditions Requested

My Mom always told me to be careful for what you ask for ... I asked for a breeze and got a windstorm.  With the winds we were only able to seed a couple of hole's fairways but the good news is we got the ones that would be in the way of the road slurry tomorrow.  Instead of seeding we were able to fertilize the fairways and tees without worrying if to irrigation needed to water the fertilizer in was going to lead to more pythium.

Between the roads being done and us having to prep the golf course there may be some things that slip through the cracks before opening.  Our number one concern is the greens the were infected with pythium and their repair ... progress has been slow but going forward.  I even had to reach into my bag of tricks from growing bentgrass in the transition zone of Memphis TN and added to that to help expedite the damaged greens repairs.

Cooler and What This ... A Slight Breeze?

Yesterday we got finally some relief from the heat in the form of clouds ... felt cooler than the 92 degrees it was.  And then this morning there was a slight breeze blowing ... this is some good news for the turf.  Today once again we addressing the bad areas with some out of the box thinking and a little fertilizer.  Additionally, we are reseeding the fairways again today.

Darn Heat and Disease

Looking good ... isn't it?  Well lets look closer.

Not as nice up close ... let's look at another green like 12.



Not bad is it ... well another look up close.

Yikes!!  Not so good after all.  So what happened??  Due to the heat and the lack of wind Pythium raised its ugly head and damaged several of the back nine greens.  We have already reseed all of them, treated the disease and continue to spike in seed to repair these damaged greens.

Today, we noticed that the seed is ready in some cases to start germinating so we spiked in the seed, and lightly topdressed them.  Rest assure, ALL efforts are focused on repairing these diseased, damaged green.

97 Yesterday

It is still too hot and still no wind.  Yesterday reached 97 degrees but according to the weather channel this (today) is the last day of the heat.  We are continuing to attack the pythium struck areas and this week will seed the fairways once again,along with some fertilization.  We are seeing some improvement on the B9 greens but this week will show if all of our hard work has been successful.

98 Again!

Can we ever get a break from this weather ... please.  I sprayed numerous pythium spots yesterday, we have had to reseed numerous areas including some of the greens and still the heat without any wind continues.  According to the weather channel relief is right around the corner however, they have been saying that over the past week ... and again yesterday was 98 degrees.

Rest assure the crew is working hard to repair all of which Mother Nature is throwing at us but a little prayer would not hurt.

Pythium

With all of the heat lately we got hit by our old friend Pythium root rot.  The good news is that we have treated the infected areas and the reseeding has begun.  The even better news is that in the Valley there are some courses that are re-seeding their greens ... luckily other than some spots we did not get hit as hard.

8's Approach Wiped Out by Pythium

KEEP OFF THE GRASS

Left of 4's Green

There are just some things in life that make you mad ... such as seeing tender young seedlings die thanks to someone want to drive past the cones and onto your hard work.

14's Rough Along Road

Then you see even more places that people drove not giving a care to the members of Avondale Golf Club or the time and effort it takes to create such a pretty golf course.

9 In Gap

But that isn't even the worst of it ... they (meaning the people who did this damage) wanted to just see how much of the golf course they could damage ... well, it was a lot.

Behind 8's Green

I just stop taking pictures of all of the damage.

Nine Days After Seed Was Put Down

We have just concluded the ninth day after seed & irrigation was finished and we are overall progress well.  The back nine greens are a touch behind where they should be but that is due to the fact that they were finished last and they are historically slightly behind the front nine.  By tomorrow with will have mowed all of the greens, tees and fairways at least once.

With all of this heat form the past week the Pythium has reared its ugly head even though we put down some preventive.  Tomorrow we will be spray all of the greens to reduce the chance of them becoming infected and I just got though purchasing some more Subdue GR to slow the Pythium in the approaches.  We have also reseeded most of the areas we have lost and expect to be almost completely recovered by then.

Flowers & First Cut

The flowers have been delivered and we have started planting them in their new design ... and yes, this year we are doing something different that I hope will be a big hit with our members.

Flowers at Entrance of the Clubhouse

Additionally, today was the first day of the mowing of some of the greens ... after further evaluation it was determined that all of the green were ready but by tomorrow we should be mowing them all (and starting a couple of the fairways).

Putting Green's First Mow