Noel Mackenzie: Why the winter is the perfect time to prepare for next summer

Seamus Rotherick
By Seamus Rotherick October 13, 2011 15:45

A key element of summer work is competition conditioning, where the course should be in peak condition and the greens hold a good and sustainable speed. The quality of surface for tournaments and even regular club play needs to be accumulated over a good base of spring and summer work; much as an athlete plans his/her competition season, so the grass must achieve a sound base condition so that it can excel in the height of the competition season. Summer preparation also requires planning when the inevitable need to restore and replenish the playing surfaces through renovations is being considered.

Preparing for summer therefore requires a view on four elements in planning:

1. The build-up to summer through spring preparatory work;

2. Preparation and maintenance of regular playing conditions;

3. Allowance for special events when the course condition may need to peak;

4. Renovation and recovery of surfaces for long term sustainability of the playing surface.

For the first, key activities need to be planned carefully if valuable resources are to be used well and to best effect. Planning for the purchase, delivery and storage of key materials through the year is therefore of prime importance.

For the second, as well as conditioning works in spring and early summer, the planning of requirements for the main summer months is also important, particularly as more care may be required, or a shift in materials used to reflect a slowing of growth in drought conditions may be needed.

For the third element, the summer brings with it the main competitions and key dates both within clubs and from outside organisations. By the start of the year the majority of these should be clearly scheduled and this allows planning of how to bring the course up to condition for the event in question. The course manager or head greenkeeper should be fully involved in planning very significant events and certainly all dates should be run by him/her before they go to print and are circulated to the membership or beyond.

This is necessary to ensure that he/she is comfortable that the club will have good facilities to offer its members and visitors for these key events and that they are timed well for the condition of the course. Equally relevant is to ensure that events are not booked at critical times when course maintenance, especially any key work required on the greens, is planned. Of course, it might be possible to move a renovation forward or backward just as easily as a competition or important society booking, but it is both important and courteous to involve the greenkeeping team before announcing a list of competition dates to players.

For the final factor, modern greenkeeping has moved to a less intrusive and more perpetual method of greens renovation, but specialist treatments might well be required for technical/agronomic or drainage improvement reasons. As part of the preparation for summer, such works, as may be required, are certainly worth considering within that planning process, even if sometimes these might fall in the very tail end of the season or creep across into autumn.

Key planning

Both club committee and greenkeeper need to work closely to ensure that all events can be hosted and yet essential course maintenance can be completed. Course managers and head greenkeepers need to schedule the work needed on the course. This will initially require analysis of the following management areas:

• Mowing. On greens, when to reduce heights of cut and by how much, is of key importance. However, the optimum cutting heights during both the spring build-up and summer routine mowing are contingent on the sward type, greens construction, weather and environment of the course.

Long rough and rough areas may also need to be scheduled in for particular work at particular times, either to give definition or to manage a certain botanical component in a wild flower sward. Likewise, re-establishing that definition between fairway and semi rough should also be a key element of spring work on the course once growth is underway.

• Scarifying. This is a key element of spring preparation on greens and is potentially disruptive.

The timing of work is dependent on weather conditions; a cold, dry spring might put work back by four or six weeks. This type of operation also has significant implications for topdressing, overseeding and fertiliser application, all of which impact on playing surfaces. Scarifying may be undertaken on other areas, particularly old fairways (and some newer ones sown with creeping bent) and approaches to greens. Specialist machinery may be necessary in either instance, especially the fairway work, and this will need to be pre-booked, perhaps for spring but also late summer.

• Aeration. A necessary ‘evil’ (from a player’s perspective) in managing soil conditions and assisting soil ecology systems to remain in good condition and the plant to maintain a healthy root system. Spring is a popular time for hollow coring greens, which can be disruptive. Through the summer months a variety of aeration techniques may be required and renovations may include the use of deep aeration or compaction relief treatments. Ordering specialist machines or purchasing these in good time is a job for late winter.

• Topdressing. Essential for good, consistent putting surfaces. Material should be carefully chosen to achieve the desired end objectives. Topdressing materials are usually ordered by now for delivery in spring, perhaps with top-up deliveries through the summer to maintain stores. Divot mix and topdressing for tees will also need to be planned for, and this material may be significantly different to that used on the greens.

• Fertiliser. Spring temperatures stimulate the grass to grow and fertiliser is essential to maintain health and turf quality, where box mowing is completed, though the type and quantities will be contingent on the general environment which the golf course exists within. Greens will have very specific requirements, and so may tees. Fairways may have no requirement or they may require some light feeding.

Projecting the likely usage in terms of quantity and timing of application is essential in the planning process, both for simplifying delivery and budgeting purposes.

• Seed. Greens’ seed should be of the highest quality and the species and even cultivars should reflect the conditions on site and perhaps what has been used historically in the case of newer courses. Tees and indeed fairway seed should also be carefully selected to achieve optimum results. Minimal seed should be kept in storage due to deterioration issues and it is preferable to order material in no more than 12 months in advance of its use.

• Irrigation. Spring testing and priming is a key summer preparation issue for this maintenance tool. Regular testing and observation should be undertaken through the year however.

• Machinery. By late February or early March all the essential machinery should be serviced and ready for action or, in the case of short-lifespan machinery, for example strimmers and so on, the replacements should have been delivered.

• Staff. It is almost impossible to licence for the eventualities that arise from human behaviour. However, having a full team in place by the end of winter, or the first few weeks of spring, is essential. Part time staff can have a significant benefit to the club and being short on these for the spring and summer months can dramatically affect playing surface quality.

Summary

Preparing for summer is as much about planning and being lucky with the weather as it is starting the first mowing operations or greens’ renovations. Players will sense that first brushstroke of spring when it arrives in bud burst and bird song and they will be eager for summer-competition standard course conditions.

Those conditions can generally be relied upon to arrive in due course but the spring build-up for the main summer events is of key importance and is certainly ‘money in the bank’ if summer conditions are less than ideal. Therefore, despite summer seeming to be some way off, planning the maintenance that prepares the course for summer is necessary, and if not yet started, necessary right now!

Seamus Rotherick
By Seamus Rotherick October 13, 2011 15:45
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