Small holes make big difference

Whether it’s preparing for local golf tournaments or a PGA Tour event, golf course superintendents are constantly under pressure to make the courses they maintain look their best. As most superintendents have experienced, there’s usually little leeway given for bad weather or soil conditions among discriminating golfers. However, with the DryJect soil aerification system, golf course superintendent Ralph Kepple is able to consistently make the East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta look its best no matter what the occasion.

East Lake Golf Club, which was the home course for Bobby Jones – one of the golf world’s icons – is a favorite haunt of golf aficionados. Historical players such as Rich Maiden and Charlie Yates and current champions such as Tiger Woods, Vijay Singh and Scott Verplank, help contribute to East Lake’s fame.

Throughout the years, East Lake has hosted many notable U.S. Golf Association and Professional Golf Association Tour events, which include the men’s and women’s U.S. Amateur Championships, the Ryder Cup, PGA Tour Championships and many regional tournaments.

To ensure that the greens are in premium condition for these golf events, Kepple often heeds the advice from turf professional experts, including PGA Tour agronomists and representatives from DryJect, which is part of Profile Products. Currently, 10 of the top 15 ranked courses in the country use DryJect’s system. However, East Lake was one of the first golf courses to use DryJect in turf preparations when they experienced a severe drought that compromised the turf’s health. Kepple used the DryJect system on green edges where the course lacked moisture during the heat of summer. Liking the results, he decided to use it on all of East Lake’s greens.

According to Joe Betulius, Profile Products’ vice president of sales, the DryJect aerification system uses water to fracture the soil while simultaneously injecting large volumes of dry material – as much as two tons per green – that allows golf course surfaces to be usable and playable in one hour. For East Lake’s course, Kepple injects Profile Porous Ceramic into the deep channels created by the DryJect. PPC often is used by professionals to help increase soil oxygen, resist compaction, eliminate localized dry spots, drain better and facilitate healthy root systems that leave turf less prone to disease.

Solutions
East Lake scheduled two DryJect applications in 2005 – one in March and another in July – with Danny Turner, an Atlanta DryJect service center operator. Each application was completed in one day. The March application was a blend of endoRoots, which contains endomycorrhizae and fertilizer, mixed with high volumes of sand and PPC. The mycorrihizae colonizes on the root system of the turf and increases its ability to absorb water and nutrients, which increases the root system’s efficiency and volume. Using a blend of dried, medium size topdressing sand with PPC (about 80 percent sand, 20 percent PPC by volume), Kepple added EndoRoots at 10 pounds to every 400 pounds of the sand/PPC mix.

The July application was designed to create open channels into the root zone, allowing the greens to dry faster after rain events and providing gas exchange sites. This application contained high volumes of sand and PPC to increase porosity of the greens during the hottest period of the summer. Kepple says using the DryJect system was vital for the July application because it created less stress for the turf than core aeration.

Results
DryJect gave Kepple a way to create a channel into the soil and fill it completely. Kepple says this method increased the course’s infiltration rate to the top 1- to 3-inch range and placed more sand in the root zone.

Kepple says another important advantage to the DryJect system is the smaller hole created and the benefits the water fracture method provides the soil.

“With a drill and fill operation, you’re left with a 1-inch hole in the surface that takes a very long time to grow back over,” he says. “The DryJect leaves a much smaller hole to fill. The dynamic effect of the DryJect in the subsurface is much greater than traditional coring techniques even though the DryJect surface hole is so small.”

Since his initial applications last year, Kepple continues to use the DryJect system and plans on intermixing a deep-tine aeration as well. The overall effect of the DryJect system has been firmer, drier and faster growing greens with improved rooting and minimal disruption to the putting surface.

“It takes vision and confidence to be one of the first courses in the country to try a new concept like DryJect, especially when the course is one of the most admired courses in the country,” Betulius says. “However, turf professionals are finding that, by embracing new technologies like DryJect, they actually are gaining more control over their turf. These elements are the keys to creating championship surfaces.” GCN

Sarah Willnerd is a writer for communications firm Swanson Russell Associates, which is located in Lincoln, Neb.