Scotsdale Update

Fall is here, and winter temperatures are coming.  Soon we will be having frost which will cause the Bermuda grass to start going dormant. Since Scotsdale has Bermuda greens that do go dormant, we do have to do some things differently.

Due to the turf going dormant, old cup plugs do not heal in on the greens. For this reason, we will be cutting 3 pins in each green for blue, red, and white flags. The ones we use for setup that day will have the flags in and we will have a special insert for the other two. This will help keep a better appearance for the greens and not have a bunch of old plugs on each of them, since over time that could be numerous. We will watch the wear around these and switch as needed to keep from thinning turf around these set positions. This will go into effect starting this weekend (October 20).

We will also be painting the greens. This is a process that we have started already by incorporating a pigment into the turf while it is still green. This is part of a process as the pigment helps hold onto the turfs natural color just a little longer. Later we will come back and spray a special turf paint to give the dormant turf a green appearance for play. As we go thru winter and see that starting to fade we will re-apply as needed.

I hope this helps everyone understand a little more about what we do and that everyone has been enjoying the course.

Kyle Soller, Superintendent, Scotsdale