Last week I traveled to Davenport, Maquoketa, Dubuque, and Waterloo/Cedar Falls. I saw very diverse conditions throughout my travels; however, there were some collective issues. Davenport offered similar circumstances to central Iowa, with large areas of rye and Poa annua winterkill. Overall greens are looking better, but are still a little behind with our consistent nights in the low 40’s. As I moved north to Maquoketa, I observed less widespread winter damage, and golf courses coming out of the ruthless winter well.
Across the state, turf managers are struggling to find
windows for their liquid preemergence applications. The weather has not
cooperated, with consistent winds in the 15+ mph range and extensive rainfall. Friday
morning, we were finally able to apply our preemergence herbicide at the
research farm (latest application to date during Dr. Christians tenure at Iowa
State). I would remain aggressive in an attempt to apply a preemergence
herbicide and believe you will receive some control. Nearly all preemergence
herbicides offer a little post control with the best being dimension
(dithiopyr). Yesterday, I talked to Dan
Smith at Carroll Municipal golf course after our IGCSA event and over the years
he usually applies his preemergent about May 10th and receives great
control. Only time will tell the overall
efficiency of our mid-May applications. I have attached a picture (Photo 1)
below of some crabgrass emergence at the ISU turf research facility from
yesterday.
In Davenport (Palmer Hills) and Dubuque (Bunker Hill), I was
presented with a new challenge on the amount of damage caused by cross-country
skiers. Both public golf courses deal with dead turf in fairways each year from
skier traffic. The below pictures are courtesy of Tim Johansen at Palmer Hills.
Tim mentioned that the turf does not usually recover until late June. I have
also noticed extensive damage to many of the evergreen trees/shrubs in Iowa and
I will address options in future blogs.
No comments:
Post a Comment