Whats up with those fairways?

We have continued maintenance as usual with a few modifications to keep ourselves and crew safe during the coronavirus pandemic.  But for the most part the on-course activities have been proceeding as normal.

Aerification is nearly complete with only tee boxes left to do.  We just finished up greens and will be topdressing them tomorrow.  They are in good shape and we expect them to heal quickly and then we will start to focus on putting quality in about ten days.

The course looks pretty good for the most part except for a couple of fairways notably #12 and #14.  These were treated aggressively last fall to remove Poa annua.  It worked well and much of the Poa was killed leaving some voids and overall thinning.  These treatments however can be pretty hard on our "good" grasses particularly bluegrass and that is showing up now with thinning and delayed green-up.  Other fairways that were treated 5, 6, 7, 17 also show signs of thinning but not to the extent that is occurring on 12 and 14.  These fairways were looking pretty good early this spring but the couple really hard freezes late in the year definitely took their toll.  We did do some seeding on the very worst spots and will really push the thin areas with fertilizer to help them thicken up.  We expect these areas to really respond as temperatures warm and will see noticeable improvement in the next month.  By June 1 these fairways should be very nice and pretty much poa free.  These pictures illustrate the difference in green-up in #16 fairway (untreated) and #14 fairway (treated)

Here is another shot of the thinning and slow development on #14.  So while it may not look the greatest right now the long term benefit of keeping the Poa population in check is our goal with these treatments.