Rough notes: Spring Creek converts

Golf Course News, Jul 2002 by Overbeck, Andrew

Editorial Focus: Turf & Seed

COLLIERVILLE, Tenn. - Though the private Spring Creek Ranch Country Club here is just three years old, the facility is tearing up its disease-prone fescue roughs in favor of new Palisades zoysiagrass.

"We had a blend of Trailblazer and Lancer 2 fescue and we have fought Pythium and brown patch from the start," said superintendent Michael Dieckhoff. "Nine months out of the year it was great but the three months that we had most of our member play it was 60 percent at best. We gave it one more year and then came to the harsh realization that there is no amount of money that will make it acceptable for play in the summertime."

Dieckhoff estimated the cost of water, fertilizer, fungicides and labor to keep the fescues going ran about $300,000 a year. Converting to Palisades zoysiagrass will cost the club $400,000, but Dieckhoff expects to recoup that in cost savings after two or three years.

The owners, Dr. David Meyer and his son Rob, decided on Palisades after much deliberation. Dr. Meyer wanted the contrast of green roughs while the Meyer zoysiagrass fairways were dormant in the wintertime and Rob wanted a more playable warm season turf. The two compromised, keeping 20 acres of the fescue mix, which would be allowed to go native, and just replacing 65 acres of rough with Palisades.

AN 'AWESOME ROUGH'

According to Dieckhoff, Palisades, which was developed by Dr. Milt Engelke at Texas A&M, made the cut because of its aggressive growing habits and softer texture.

"It is very fast growing," said Dieckhoff. "We have had sod down on one greens complex for six days now and already the seams are disappearing. It also does really well in the shade."

Winstead Turf Farms, which owns the rights to Palisades in Tennessee, Mississippi and Arkansas, is supplying the turf for Spring Creek.

"This is the first big job that we have done since planting our first crop of Palisades in 1999," said Winstead Turf Farms owner Bobby Winstead. "It will be an awesome rough for those guys. It has better shade tolerance, is not as prone to thatch and is less susceptible to patch diseases."

Work on the front nine at Spring Creek started at the end of March and Dieckhoff was scheduled to wrap up work at the end of June when he will start on the back nine. Greens and bunker surrounds and lake banks are being sodded and the rest will be plugged with two-inch-by-two-inch plugs.

THE CONVERSION PROCESS

The first phase of the conversion process involved killing off the old fescue stands. A week after the initial application of Roundup, the crew came in and scalped the turf down to an inch and then applied Roundup again to clean up any turf that was missed the first time. Then Dieckhoff brought in a flail mower to get it down to dirt and expose the sandcap. A three-quarter-inch hollow tine aerifier run in tight circles prepared the seedbed and an application of Ronstar pre-emergent herbicide finished the job.

Dieckhoff brought in Morrison, Tenn.based the Turf Co. to handle stripping work around the bunkers and other sensitive areas.

With the sodding done on the front nine, Dieckhoff s attention turned to the plugging process. The club went with plugs because sprigs would have had a harder time establishing since the sandcap would have diminished water retention.

"Establishment is the big thing here, we will keep them wet, but we are already cutting back on the amount of fertilization we thought we would have to give them," said Dieckhoff. "Instead of half a pound of nitrogen a week, we are going with half a pound every three weeks. It also doesn't take as much water as we thought. Initially we will give the plugs three minutes of water every hour, but after two to three weeks we will back off."

The conversion process will be completed this summer and Dieckhoff expects to have 80 to 90 percent coverage by the end of September and full coverage by the end of the year.