Bermudagrass Fairway Update

A couple weeks ago when it was warmer, we scalped the bermudagrass fairways.  They greened up perfectly.  Then we had a cold spell with a couple nights in the upper 30s.  This caused some of the bermuda to turn purple!

Below you can see the new green tissue.

Some fairways have round dead spots.  This is Spring Dead Spot disease.  Currently there is NO reliable treatment or protocol for this disease.  We can grow these patches back together in warm weather.

There is some Large Patch disease in a couple spots.

There are a few flooded spots from Hurricane Sandy that we are watching for possible winterkill.

Overall, the bermudagrass seems to have come through winter and the hurricane in good shape.  We are waiting for some consistently warm, sunny days to jump start the fairways with fertilizer.  I expect them to be outstanding again this season.  The continued weather pattern has allowed some growth, but  we dont want to set progress back by mowing them during this cold streak of weather.

Poa Annua Control

The picture is pretty self explanatory.  The darker green turf is creeping bentgrass.  The lighter green is poa annua.  Poa annua reproduces from seed.  Much of the explosion of poa on Newport Bay can be traced to a couple things.  First we have committed to bermudagrass fairways.  In doing this, we spray the fairways clean in the winter with RoundUp.  We preemerge them with Barricade in September to prevent poa.  There is a huge seedbed in the greens from the previous years of non control.  The second contributor is we have worked very hard to attempt to balance all of our soil nutrients.  Together with the damp weather it is truly a perfect storm.

There are some new products on the market like Xonerate and experimental product from Korea-Poa Cure.  They show a lot of promise, but they are still in their infant stage of use and development.  The problem is there is a fair amount of pow, so for the time being, we try to control seed heads and stunt it with growth regulators to allow the bentgrass as much advantage as we can.

The problem in the spring of 2013 with growth regulators is it has been much below normal temperature wise.  This has caused the growth regulators to react very differently in the plant.  Last week we had three nights in the 30s with scattered frost.  The poa annua on the Newport greens has turned bronze.  The good thing is the poa is suppressed and the green is not as bumpy as it would be without regulation.