It was just about two weeks ago that courses in the northern part of the region had to delay tee times on a Saturday due to frost. If your course is farther south, frost may not have been an issue but cooler-than-normal weather had slowed growth of bermudagrass considerably.
In less than a week the region went from unseasonably cool to hot and dry. Depending on where your course is located, it might have been two to three weeks since the last rain. With low humidity and windy conditions also present, supplemental watering was needed in full force.
This is a good time to remind golfers about why it is normal to encounter members of the maintenance team hand watering an area or perhaps manually operating irrigation heads during the summer months. This scenario plays out on courses throughout the Northeast, regardless of how old the irrigation system is. The best, most-efficient irrigation systems are designed to replenish what was lost that day due to evapotranspiration, not to make up for drought and water deficits. Site-specific watering is necessary to supply larger volumes of water to dry areas.
It’s also important to mention that when courses are dry it is better for playability and grass health if water management focuses on playability, not color. Watering to keep a course green everywhere during a drought can be detrimental to playability. The amount of water required to maintain green color throughout could cause saturated, even soggy, conditions in low-lying areas or where irrigation heads overlap. Maintaining sufficient water to keep plants healthy could mean they turn a little off-color, which is fine.
Northeast Region Agronomists:
Adam Moeller, director, Green Section Education – amoeller@usga.org
Darin Bevard, director, Championship Agronomy – dbevard@usga.org
Elliott Dowling, agronomist – edowling@usga.org
John Daniels, agronomist – jdaniels@usga.org