Sprays, weevils and seeding.

Today we were able to get out and spray fairways for the first time in nearly a month, and normally with the weather we've been having we would have a lot of disease. However, the last time we sprayed we tried a new product called Xzemplar and had great success. I'm not sure if you guys noticed, but the fairways are very clean. It's nice to have a product in our rotation that lasts for such a long time. However, the 28 days of control are up so we had to go back out and get them again. Hopefully this clean start to the year will continue. 

On the range tee today I found an Annual Bluegrass Weevil larvae in the thatch layer eating away at our grass. Now, we've been monitoring these guys and have sprayed for them already, but the fact that we found a few weevils doesn't really mean anything, except they somehow survived the first spray we put out for them. If we have a few weevils out on the course they won't do enough damage to disrupt the stand of grass or the playing surface. The only reason why I found it was because I was trying; at a glance you can't really see any damage. We have one more application of insecticide to put out for them and that should give us control for the rest of the year. As you can see below, they don't look like much, but if you let them go unchecked they are capable of doing a lot of damage. 

Finally, after seeing the success we had in the short rough with the bluegrass germination, we decided to try seeding some other rough areas that are heavily infested with bentgrass. The two spots we started with were at the beginnings of 3 and 5 fairway. Hopefully in a few months the bluegrass will have taken hold and start out competing the bent. Below is the beginning of 5 fairway. The lighter spot is all bentgrass and we used a slit seeder to get the seed down in there. Now, we will wait and hopefully watch the bluegrass take over. 

Ian