Fusariummy

Turfgrass management is a constant battle. Grass vs disease, grass vs weeds, and even grass vs grass. Sometimes it's obvious who is winning the battle but sometimes the victorious organism is less obvious. This week while looking over some old pictures of the moss disease on my practice green (the moss is all gone by the way) I noticed something that I think could be useful for turf managers to quickly gauge which plant is winning and which is losing. Take a look at the following pic of poa taking over silvery thread moss with the help of some sort of fungi. It looks very similar to the next picture with is Microdochium nivale totally destroying my approaches a few years back. And this picture of cyanobacteria thinning poa on my greens. In all these cases the organism that is winning the battle has a round shape. In the first picture the grass is winning, and in the next two the grass is losing and the fungi/bacteria/algae are winning. Obviously if the conditions are favorable for ...

This week on twitter I saw an interesting tweet. Va. Tech's Shawn Askew at Nufarm turf conference: "We've evaluated 2 fungal organisms that attack moss on greens." pic.twitter.com/JJxvwh0fDS — SuperintendentMag (@SuperintndtMag) June 15, 2016 This triggered my memory of the moss disease I had on my greens a few years ago. I wrote about that in a post in 2013 . The reason I hadn't thought much about this interesting moss disease was that for the most part the moss on my greens is gone. What did I spray? Well in 2012 I sprayed Kocide 2000. It worked but was pretty harsh on my turf and the moss quickly came back. In 2014 I sprayed quicksilver but left my upper practice green unsprayed to see what would happen with the serious moss disease infestation. Also, this spray wasn't successful with most of the moss coming back shortly after my 3 successive applications. In 2013 my upper practice green looked like this. Today it looks like this and I have not sprayed anyt...

                                               I noticed something interesting happening to the moss on my practice green this summer. It appeared to be under attach by some sort of pathogen. I posted some pictures online when I first made the observation and had literally no feedback as to what it could be. Maybe no one had seen this on their course because they didn't have this much moss? The first time I head of the possibility of this disease was from the Superintendent at my neighbour course. He had a very slight case of this but it really wasn't that obvious and I shrugged it off as nothing. I was really surprised to see such a widespread incidence on my practice green this spring. Today I came across a blog post from Dan Strey from Iowa State University who had made a similar observation in one of his moss studies. He found it to be  Sclerotium rolfsii and...

Lately I have begun to change the way I approach weeds in the landscape. In my experience over the past decade I have seen a lot of weed management failures, not just on the golf course but also on people's home lawns. I have noticed a few things and here is what I have got. The principle is this: Instead of focusing on the pest, focus on the desirable species. It might sound easy but it is really a hard thing to do.  Take dandelions in your home lawn for example. When dandelions sprout on most people's lawns their first reaction is "what do I apply to kill these dandelions?" While this is a fantastic short term solution it really solves nothing over time and not after long the lawn is usually plagued with more dandelions. Instead of focusing your energy on the dandelion focus on the needs of the turf. The dandelions aren't the issues. The turf that is weak and unable to out-compete the dandelions is the real issue. I am often approached by members telling me I be...

This morning while checking on my moss study plots I was treated to a pleasant surprise. The study putting green was caked in fusarium patch just the same as the rest of my putting surfaces. I always gravitate towards the plot that is rolled 8x a day just to see how it is managing. The turf was slightly thinning but there was absolutely no fusarium present! At first I was a bit surprised but then again it's no big deal to not see any disease on a small 4'x4' section of the putting green turf even with severe disease pressure. I kept on looking at all the plots to rate them on fusarium severity. I made a hasty observation that plots that were rolled at least 4x/day had no disease where plots with 2-3x/day had some disease and the control plots were severely infected. Wow! We know rolling has an effect on Dollar Spo t but Fusarium? Really? These observations are very early and clearly demand further investigation. This moss study is a long term pet project of mine so it shou...

What is a weed? One definition I found was: A plant considered undesirable, unattractive, or troublesome, especially one growing where it is not wanted, as in a garden. On some golf courses weeds can be a constant battle. Turf managers often have to go out of their way to deal with the pesky plants. Often the weeds on a golf course are harmful to the turf and the environment. Invasive species for example are a major problem all over the world. In other instances it is the native species that are the culprits. The past few years that I have worked at the Pender Harbour Golf Club have taught me a lot of things. One of those things is how to deal with weeds. At Pender Harbour we might look at "weeds" a little differently than most other golf courses. Clover growing in the turf Take White Clover (Trifolium repens) for example. Our rough, fairways and tees are full of clover. Clover is usually a sign of poor soil nutrition and drought. This is very true especially for the rough ar...

Late last year I made an interesting observation about how moss grew in relation to traffic patterns on putting greens. More about that can be read here . Shade makes it hard to grow healthy dense turf that can compete with moss. I have decided to study the effects of traffic and wear on moss populations on our practice chipping green this year. I have divided the putting green into plots that will be rolled daily the number of times indicated on each plot. We are using this green because in the past it has always had a problem with moss infestation due to the challenging growing conditions, namely shade, that are present on this site. The results from this study will hopefully help golf course superintendents better understand moss on putting greens and will hopefully help them manage their turf to control or prevent moss without the need for chemical pesticides. Thank you for your patients and understanding during this study.  Please continue to use this green as you normally wou...

Ok so moss has been on my mind lately.  It all started with a trip to a nearby golf course to look at their chemical moss control results over a few beers (pilsner).  We noticed that it seemed like the Kocide (copper hydroxide) was working pretty good.  The moss was turning black which signified that it was dead. The following picture started me thinking.  There was no moss where the tires of the triplex mower travelled on the clean up cut.  Why was this?  I posted in an earlier blog entry about possible reasons but I think I have figured it out.  Before we get into what I think I feel that it is important to go over some characteristics of moss and also what other are recommending for moss control. Moss does not have roots.  It has rhizoids which serve solely as anchors.  They do not absorb nutrients or water.  Moss requires any moisture to be absorbed through their above ground surfaces. Most papers that I have read on cultur...

On a recent trip to a neighbouring golf course we were checking out their progress on moss eradication.  In Canada, Kocide 2000 has recently been registered for use to control silvery thread moss.  As can be seen from the picture, we like to drink pilsner AND the moss control is working. Kocide 2000's active ingredient is copper hydroxide.  When sprayed in high volumes of water over numerous applications it has been very successful in controlling moss on putting greens.  Some people suggest that adding wetting agents and acidifying agents also help the efficacy of the Kocide.  Others add iron as well to reduce the effects that copper has on inducing an iron deficiency in the plants.  It is not uncommon for the turf to turn a bright orange colour after a Kocide application unless iron is also applied. The real neat thing about the above picture is not how great the Kocide is working but the two linear tracks of turf that don't have any moss on them.  Th...