Maintaining Poa greens is an annual mental and physical beat down

Seeking Poa-topia

Features - Turf

Maintaining Poa greens is an annual mental and physical beat down for many turfheads. However, the right mindset can overcome the uneasiness the variety causes and help you meet player expectations.

January 21, 2016
Guy Cipriano

                         

© SIphotography

 

The mental side of golf is a mega-business. Books and videos designed to help players shave strokes saturate the market. Tour pros often laud their mental skills coach as often as a swing or short game instructor.
Now consider the mental side of golf course maintenance. How a superintendent and crew handle clutch moments can shape careers. Ever try to keep greens alive, and Mr. and Mrs. Smith from complaining about them in Chicago, Pittsburgh or the Capital Beltway during a sticky August? Unlike the millionaire on TV trying to sink 4-footers, you most likely don’t lean on a psychologist who specializes in superintendent behavior when times get tough.
Of all the mentally taxing maintenance moments, managing Poa annua greens ranks among the trickiest. No matter what new product or research emerges, the grass variety tests the fortitude of those who work closely with it.
“I guess the way you can visualize it that most people can relate is that managing Poa annua is a lot like being a doctor or a nurse in an intensive care unit,” says Dan Dinelli, a third-generation superintendent who manages bentgrass-Poa greens at North Shore Country Club in suburban Chicago. “You are on call constantly. And there are some doctors and nurses that you run into that are in the intensive care ward that thrive at it and they love it. They love that pressure. If not, they don’t last very long. They don’t stick it out.”
Dinelli calls managing Poa greens “a love-hate relationship,” and uses words such as “addictive” and “consuming” when trying to get it to perform at a high level. He compares managing Poa during extreme weather swings to babysitting. The best babysitters never become complacent.

Poa across the pond

North American superintendents aren’t the only turf managers mentally jarred by Poa annua.
European course managers and superintendents are also tested by Poa despite a temperate climate throughout most of the continent. The reason? Fewer chemicals designed to help golf courses are approved by the European Union for widespread usage compared to the United States.
Known as annual meadowgrass in Europe, Poa started becoming a more accepted putting surface within the last 20 years, according to Kevin Munt, the founder of Kevin Munt golf consultants and former course/links manager at multiple high-level clubs including Royal Dornoch and Wentworth. Still, keeping the variety separated from bentgrass without having a wide selection of chemicals available means restless moments for course managers. “Yes, it drives them mad,” Munt says. “The big issue really is whether we end up with complete chemical bans or greater restrictions on chemical uses on golf courses. Then it’s what the hell do you do with annual meadowgrass?”
Commitment at the club level is a key to avoiding potentially stressful situations created by Poa in Europe. Hiring somebody with links experience, where fescue-bentgrass greens are desired, to manage a parkland golf course with Poa annua could seriously damage all parties involved.

“If you are going to manage annual meadowgrass on a parkland golf course, there is no point in having links guys totally committed to growing bent-fescue,” Munt says. “It really needs to be written into the club’s course management policy document. It has become quite a big thing over here. It’s outlined how the club runs through the future and sort of supplies the job description for the course manager. If it states in there they are going to manage annual meadowgrass greens as best as possible, then that’s what you have to do.”
The same thinking can be applied in the U.S. If you haven’t managed widespread Poa, you might be doing yourself a personal favor by avoiding jobs with Poa greens and lofty putting surface expectations.

“You have a bentgrass green if you are in the middle of the summer where stress is fairly high and usage is high and expectations are high, you might be able to go home at 4 o’clock or 3:30,” he says. “With Poa annua that happens far less. It demands your attention.”
USGA Green Section agronomist Adam Moeller describes Poa as “unforgiving to the point where if you miss a syringe by about 30 minutes or an hour that can be the difference between that grass dying and surviving.” Big challenges also exist in the winter.
Moeller, though, works in the USGA’s Northeast Region, meaning he visits numerous courses that successfully maintain the variety, including past and future U.S. Open sites. Superintendents who endure the grind produced by Poa greens display some shared characteristics.

“It definitely takes good communication with their membership, because they know there are ups and downs with the grass, with the seedheads, with potential winter injury and with just how hard you can push it in the summer,” Moeller says. “It’s communicating to their members and golfers that it can’t be maintained at an ultra-high level the whole season. There are going to be some peaks and valleys.
“Hard-working is probably one of the easiest descriptive words for superintendents that are managing high-quality Poa greens,” he adds. “Hard-working and well-staffed, because it’s not a grass that you can kind of rest easy and rest on your laurels even for a little bit. One superintendent isn’t going to be able to manage this grass at a high level on their own. They are going to need a strong support system to make sure it’s not going to check out under the tough weather conditions.”

Superintendents managing Poa greens have a love-hate relationship with the turf because it’s such a challenge to get it to perform at a high level.

© guy cipriano

 

And Poa just doesn’t pester the head superintendent. Few things are as deflating as watching crew members spend entire shifts hand watering and finessing a grass variety with shallow roots while member are trying to play the course, Dinelli says.
John Alexander, the superintendent at Fircrest Golf Club in Fircrest, Wash., has spent his entire career managing Poa at Pacific Northwest courses. He says he’s fortunate to be working in the ideal climate for the variety and at a facility with reasonable expectations. But that doesn’t mean he’s operating in Poa-topia. A dry spring and summer in 2015 tested Alexander, assistant superintendent Ryan Fink and the rest of the Fircrest crew.
“There’s no doubt that when you have a summer like that you will be dragging hoses,” Alexander says. “And by the time September came around, I was more than happy to put my hose down every once in a while. It can be a drag. That’s the mental drag of it. Every day, the little bad spots, the little dry spots.”
Fostering a team atmosphere helped Alexander handle 2015. Everybody on the Fircrest crew, including Alexander and Fink, hand watered greens. When determining assignments, Alexander says Fink dispersed hand-watering responsibilities.
Making himself visible to the membership during stressful periods also helps Alexander handle the mental side of maintaining Poa greens. The more members know about Poa’s challenges, the more they understand what a superintendent and crew experience when it becomes temperamental.

Fircrest Golf Club is a Pacific Northwest facility with a large percentage of Poa annua in its greens. Superintendent John Alexander says being accessible to members helps him manage the grass.

© guy cipriano

 

“Just being out there on the course, playing a little bit of golf with the members helps,” Alexander says. “Being an old codger, I don’t blog and do a lot of that stuff, but I put a lot of thought into my newsletter articles each month. We have bulletin boards in the locker rooms. I try to change out some articles about it. We have 10, 15, 20 percent bent in our Poa. That’s one of the bigger questions I get, ‘What’s this grass here that just doesn’t blend in perfectly?’”
Demands for firmness represent one of the biggest changes in Poa management, and Alexander says those can be met by believing in your agronomic and irrigations programs. He concedes it would be less stressful to turn up the irrigation system, but hand watering and “liberal” use of wetting agents provide firmer surfaces at Fircrest.
Poa can limit promoting firmness in certain areas, Moeller says, although courses such as Winged Foot, where a greens reconstruction improved the root-zone mixture, provide evidence that Poa can play firm. Dinelli views the demands for firmness – which he tries to meet at North Shore – as part of the evolving mental game involving superintendents, golfers and Poa annua.
“I guess we have satisfied the golfers’ need with the speed issue and they have moved on to firmness,” Dinelli says. “You are always trying to raise the bar in some category. Now there’s a lot of pressure to keep things firm and much of firmness relates to how dry the surface is, and that becomes really challenging when you have primarily Poa annua in the middle of the summer and the roots are extremely shallow and you are trying to maintain a firm surface. That can be a nightmare. It takes a ton of babysitting.”

Winter is Not 'Down Time' on the Golf Course

COURSE CARE

Winter is Not 'Down Time' on the Golf Course January 02, 2014 By Bud White and Ty McClellan, USGA

A snow-covered golf course may suggest that all is quiet on-site, but there is a lot of behind-the-scenes work happening in preparation for next season. (USGA)
                                   

What goes on at your golf facility during the winter? This piece from 2009 details a number of duties and projects that may surprise many golfers.
Much like sports, the biggest gains in golf course improvements are achieved in the off-season. Necessary and/or desired course improvements oftentimes demand significant time, labor, and occasionally large equipment, all of which result in varying degrees of course disruption. This being the case, the real gains are achieved when additional man-hours are available and work can be performed most efficiently and without causing undue interference to play. During the golfing season, golf course maintenance is geared entirely to daily play and special events, leaving little time to do more than make only minor course adjustments and improvements.
The following list of activities and projects won't encompass all that can be performed during the winter months, nor is it supposed to do so. Rather, this article is intended to assist green committees, boards of directors, and other course officials, as well as golfers, to appreciate and better understand what winter golf course maintenance entails. The list of winter duties and projects outlined below might surprise the average golfer.
GENERAL DUTIES
Snow Removal from Roads and Parking Lots: Most, if not all, northern golf courses have at least some snow removal responsibilities during the winter. Depending on acreage and annual snowfall, snow removal requirements for some courses will be much more extensive than for others. Given the unpredictability of winter weather events, it is generally required that at least one person be kept on call for clearing snow during such events. Snow maintenance includes plowing roads and parking lots, blowing or shoveling walkways, and applying de-icing agents.
Winter Play Setup Duties: While generally not recommended in the northern United States,some winter play does occur and golfers still have expectations for course conditioning. It should also be noted that if winter play is allowed, not only should more staff be in place during the winter to accommodate play, but many· more labor hours will be required to repair the course for the beginning of spring play (another article in itself).
Landscape Cleanup: Snow, ice, wind, and rain require debris cleanup across the property,whether it be to accommodate winter play or to prepare the course for spring opening. This includes downed tree branches and accumulations of leaves, soil, or anything that moving surface water leaves behind on the grounds. Remulching landscape and flower beds is another great winter project.
Covering Greens: For courses that annually suffer winter damage to their greens, covering them with straw, tarps, or synthetic covers, and heavy sand topdressings, just to name a few, can be essential to avoid turf loss. Many man-hours are required in covering and protecting greens, particularly if covers must be removed or applied several times throughout the winter.
Monitoring Ice on Greens: If by mid-February or early March continuous ice cover still exists, it may need to be removed or broken to allow gas exchange to avoid turf loss due to lack of oxygen. Although winter injury is poorly understood despite decades of research, the threshold for Poa annua is assumed to be close to about 50 days, whereas creeping bentgrass can tolerate continuous ice cover much longer. Regardless of these guidelines, monitoring of ice is necessary in northern states and, depending on the intensity and duration of the winter, breaking ice to save greens may be required.
Snow Removal from Greens: Snow is welcome during the winter,insulating the turf from desiccating winter winds and temperature extremes, but sometimes it must bere moved from greens to hasten ice melt, speed surface thawing during the spring, or allow surface melt to be directed off the greens where it cannot accumulate and refreeze. Snow removal from greens is almost always performed manually so as to avoid mechanical damage to green contours.
Monitoring Course Conditions: In addition to monitoring the golf course regularly, many superintendents frequently perform plug checks to monitor turf health and check for winter damage. This is done by removing soil samples and placing them indoors on window sills where they warm with sunlight. Doing so in advance is a great way to determine if winter turf injury will be an issue, in which case communication and recovery plans can begin.
Winter Fungicide Applications: In northern climates, various numbers of timely fungicide applications are used for control of pink snow mold, or Microdochium patch (Microdochium nivale), and gray snow mold (Typhulaspp.) that frequent most cool-season turfgrasses.
Winter Weed Control: For facilities in the transition zone, where bermudagrass and zoysia grass go completely dormant, controlling actively growing winter weeds, such as Poa annua with pre- and post-emergent herbicides is a must. As with all pesticide applications, staff are required to be trained and certified.
Burning Native Roughs: Burning in early spring is the best weed control method and the healthiest management for maintenance and cleanup of native vegetation. It has always been Mother Nature's way of maintaining the native plains. In addition to a burn permit, make sure to notify applicable parties in the area when burning, including the fire department.
Advance Ordering of Fertilizers, Pesticides, and Other Chemicals: Bulk ordering of fertilizers and pesticides during the winter months can produce significant cost savings as a result of early order discounts, but doing so requires excellent forecasting, budgeting, and planning, all of which takes time.Although this certainly applies to all facilities,those owned by management companies,government agencies, municipalities, and the like require a minimum of three bids for each specification of a product purchase. Depending on the situation, creating detailed specifications to obtain fair, competitive bids for every purchase order can be quite time consuming.
Capital Purchases: Maintenance equipment and other capital purchases typically require similar purchasing and bidding processes, as outlined above for chemicals and fertilizers.
Continuing Education: Whether it be the annual Golf Industry Show, local superintendent chapter meetings, USGA regional conferences,pesticide recertification workshops, etc., continuing education is needed to stay abreast of the newest chemistries, technologies, products, and techniques. Continuing education is required not just in certain instances (such as pesticide applicators); it is integral to the success of the facility.
TYPICAL WINTER PROJECTS
Annual Equipment Maintenance and Repairs: Some equipment operates seven days a week all through the growing season, and others run two to three days per week on average. Parts become worn and need to be replaced, fittings loosen, bearings and seals wear out, engines and motors require tune-ups, and wiring needs to be inspected.
Extensive preventative maintenance in the winter is crucial for equipment reliability during the golfing season, and reducing costly breakdowns results in substantial cost savings. Additionally, there simply is not time to have multiple pieces of equipment waiting for parts or repair during the summer. While breakdowns in the summer cannot be eliminated, winter prevention and maintenance can go a long way in assisting with equipment durability and dependability.
Keeping equipment clean and operating efficiently does not just mean a better conditioned golf course; it also increases equipment longevity and trade-in value. "The value of the maintenance fleet more than justifies preventative maintenance and regular service. Maximizing the investment in equipment is good business sense and important to the viability of the overall golf course operation." ¹ Do not forget equipment painting needs as well.
Mower Blade Sharpening and Reel Grinding: With dozens of reels and blades on multiple fairway, green, tee, and rough mowers,diligent sharpening and grinding of cutting units in-house takes weeks. Some courses contract out this work, but it can be very expensive. As such, investing in reel and blade grinding/sharpening equipment, and performing this job in-house, can produce significant cost savings. Bearings, seals, and roller rebuilding are necessary, too.
Tree Maintenance: Selective tree removal and pruning is needed annually to improve growing conditions by increasing sunlight exposure and air flow. Trees or branches that unduly interfere with play or intended architectural design should be eliminated. Annual winter tree maintenance also includes thinning of dense tree populations to reduce overcrowding, clearing understory brush, raising canopies for improved air flow, and addressing trees damaged during winter storms.
Drainage: Limited or no play during the winter is a great time to address deficiencies in drainage. This includes repairing existing drainage tile that has become compromised and no longer functions properly, or the addition of new drainage in areas that drain poorly. To improve poorly draining areas or small pockets that hold water, this can also be achieved through regrading drain basin contours.
Irrigation System: All facets of an irrigation system require annual attention. This includes routine servicing of pump stations as well as upgrading deteriorating irrigation components, leveling heads, and mapping of new irrigation lines and heads.
Putting Green Collar Maintenance and Leveling: Collars are areas of the course that are often overlooked, but they benefit from routine maintenance. This includes leveling,redefining widths, expansion, and relocation.
Tee Leveling, Rebuilding, and Expansion: Intense play and divoting from the centers of teeing grounds may produce surface unevenness that causes playing areas to remain wet, as surface water no longer exits off the tees as originally designed. The opposite also can be true. If aggressive divot-filling programs are in place, excess accumulation causes the center of tees to form a crown. Or, throughout the season it may be obvious that a tee is simply undersized for the amount of play it receives, which is most likely on holes 1 and 10, where additional practice swings are frequently used. In either case, the winter months provide a great opportunity to level, rebuild, or expand tees for the upcoming season.
Bunkers: The general industry standard for the lifespan of bunker sand is five to seven years before it must be replaced. This occurs because silt and clay impede bunker drainage and offer poor playability. Winter months are a great time to replace bunker sand, if needed, or replenish sand if more is needed. To keep bunkers draining properly, it also is wise to inspect the drain system so that tile lines can be cleaned or replaced.
Cart Path Repair: At some point, highway sand streets require repair, and cart paths are no different. Winter months, when temperature and conditions allow, are a great time to prepare cart paths for the upcoming season. Curbing can be built as well.
Maintenance Facility Improvements: An organized, clean, and operative maintenance facility does not happen by itself, and directing some attention here goes a long way to improving employee morale, better productivity and efficiency, and attracting and retaining quality employees.
Pump House, Rest Stations, and Other Small Buildings: There is no rule that states that these structures must be eyesores. Rather, when routinely painted and well maintained, even these facilities can be aesthetically pleasing.
Golf Course Accessories: These include tee markers, wastebaskets, ball washers, benches, bunker rakes, bag racks, etc., and because all are outdoor accessories that endure the elements, all require restoration every now and again. Golf course accessories should be cleaned, repaired, refurbished, painted, or built new, when necessary. New or updated accessories are noticed by golfers.
Soil Testing: Although it may not be practical to obtain soil samples during the winter, it is an opportune time to review soil test results from the previous season (and past years to evaluate trends, if any). Fertility needs should be addressed, and changes, if any, can be anticipated for the upcoming season. This allows for late winter soil amendment applications that may be in order.
Water Testing: Winter is a good time to establish baseline numbers on water purity, as water should be at its purest at that time. By running a water test in the winter and again in mid-summer, the relative ranges of water quality used to irrigate your golf course can be obtained.
Other projects that can be performed during the winter may include installing a brick patio outside the clubhouse,installing a deep well, repairing a leaking water fountain line, cleaning/servicing/painting/installing large fans used to circulate air on greens, refurbishing the facility's main entrance gate, and everything in between. Winter also presents a great time to develop maintenance standards and review safety and training procedures.

REFERENCE
¹ Nelson, M. 2004. Mountain standard time (February, 2004).
 Bud White is director of the USGA Green Section's Mid-Continent Region and Ty McClellan is manager of Green Section Education.

View from #13 Tee before and after.

1.50" of rain....70" in 1 hour. 16 Hrs. later (2/17)

1.50" of rain....70" in 1 hour Hole #9 and 18 (2/16)