Fairway Aerification Cancel The title field is required!

1. Scott Landstrom

   

   2 posts
   
   10/10/2019 12:10 PM

   Anybody out there using a verticut & vertiquake process in place of pulling cores/solid tining and topdressing?
   
   Being short on labor and reliable equipment has led me to rethink the process that has been done by the past regime.  Too few guys to pick up cores and our tycrops cant make it through 60 acres of fairway reliably.
   
   So my plan is to verticut - to remove thatch mechanically
   and vertiquake - to relieve soil compaction
   Then, problem areas/specific landing zones can be cored and topdressed reliably and properly on a multiyear rotation.
   
   I have seen it work in the Midwest, anybody doing anything similar out here in the northwest/Seattle area?  Anybody doing it anywhere?  Any ideas or suggestions I'd love to hear.
   
   

   
   
   
   
2. Christopher Thuer

   

   101 posts
   
   10/10/2019 6:10 PM in reply to Scott Landstrom

   Great question. 
   
   I have been thinking of this for several years.  It became impossible to get even half of our fairways cored in the fall so we gave up on even trying several years ago.  Too much play and not enough help.  Since then we have been doing a spring and a fall solid tine.  I have been trying to get the owners to buy a verticut attachment for over a year.  We did a demo of a nice unit last month and got a quote and sent the video of the demo and the quote to the owners.  Almost there.
   
   We can solid tine the fairways in 2 to 3 days depending on how much play there is when before we were lucky to get 1 fairway per day cored and cleaned up.  The par 5 we would split into 2 days.  We would start the next Monday after labor day and if we could get 3 done per week it was a great week but 2 was the norm.  Then with frost delays and rainy weather we would be done mid October.
   
   I proposed the idea of 2 solid tines and 2 verticuts per year to the good folks at Purdue during field day and was met with some resistance because they would like for us to core.  My argument is that something is better than nothing.

   
   Chris Thuer, CGCS, Bear Slide Golf Club, Cicero, IN
   
   

   Last modified on 10 Oct 2019 23:10 by Christopher Thuer
3. Kyle Fick

   

   4 posts
   
   10/11/2019 9:10 AM

   I have moved from wall to wall coring to slicing whenever we have the opportunity.  Labor is the number one killer for us.  I simply do not have the labor to be effective cleaning up cores in the fall, if we leave them sit let the freeze and thaw of winter soften them to drag quickly, it can really hamper our opening date.  Something is better than nothing, our KBG and Fine Fescue doesn't receive any de-thatching techniques unfortunately, but it hasn't become an issue thus far.  We still try to core and remove the super high traffic locations and so on.  Heck, labor has been so sparse as of late and weather patterns so fluctuant, I haven't even done my tees and this year.  

   
   
   
   
4. Gordon Seliga

   

   4 posts
   
   11/14/2019 8:11 AM

   Every situation is different but I haven't pulled a plug on fairways in over 15 years. Solid tine twice a year. Fairways are bent and thatch has not been a problem. Fairways are tight! We do collect clippings and paclobutrazole is a regular application. As mentioned in the earlier posts, labor as well as the mess is an issue with coring not to mention pulling up weed seed or poa seeds. Solid tinning is relatively unobtrusive but it does take us a while to aerate at 2 x 2.5 inch spacing with one machine. I have no plans to pull cores again on fairways.
   
   It works for us...

   
   
   
   
5. Christopher Thuer

   

   101 posts
   
   11/14/2019 3:11 PM in reply to Gordon Seliga

   Gordon, where are you located and how much N do you put on them?  He have about 25 acres of Pennlinks/Penneagle FW/Ap.  We are cutting back N next year to help with thatch.  We stopped collecting clippings last year after doing so for 17 seasons and someone follows with a pull behind buffalo.  It takes about 4 hours to blow off the fairways while it saves the mowers 30 to 45 minutes each not having to dump.  I do pound them every 2 weeks with a growth regulator combo and there were days when the blower stopped after a couple of holes because there was no need to blow.  We mow fw's 2x per week, Tues and Fri.  We haven't had a problem attracting labor.  Budget restrictions are the limiting factor. 

   
   Chris Thuer, CGCS, Bear Slide Golf Club, Cicero, IN
   
   
6. Gordon Seliga

   

   4 posts
   
   11/15/2019 6:11 AM in reply to Christopher Thuer

   Chris, I am located in Erie, PA. I don't track annual N inputs but roughly 1/10 lb per week during the growing season, sometimes a little less sometimes a little more. In addition to paclobutrazole, we do weekly (200 GDD) T-Nex apps to help keep the growth to a minimum and Paclo apps every two weeks. The Paclo rates vary depending on weather as in peak summer Paclo can cause some injury on Poa so we back off the Paclo going into July. In Mid August we ramp up the Paclo rates again and continue into late fall. We mow 2-3 times per week and collect. The mowing staff will let me know if the clippings are increasing as they don't like to get off of the machine to empty the buckets. The par 3's can get thatchy as we mow those with a triplex (floating hread). I think the down pressure on the fairway mowers give a tighter cut and has an some impact on thatch formation.