Welcome to the “Turf Hotline” sponsored by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs for the week of June 23 -30, 2000.
All week we have had showers everyday. The temperatures have been cool to seasonal, with cool night temperatures. For the coming weekend the weather is supposed to warm up to the mid to high 20’s.
Dollar spot started about two weeks ago and it will continue as long as we have warm, wet weather or heavy dews. There is a lot of leaf spot and there has been lots of “melting out” on Kentucky bluegrass lawns, sod farms and sports fields reported. To help the turf recover, raise the mowing height and fertilize lightly. It is quite unbelievable, but there is still evidence of Fusarium patch here at GTI on our research greens. It is not very active and the turf will quickly grow out of it at this time of year. In addition, any treatments for dollar spot will also halt the Fusarium patch. More reports of anthracnose basal rot have come in over the last week. This is often worse after topdressing or verticutting. Wounding the turf provides an entrance into the turf plant for this disease organism.
European chafers began flying last week in the Guelph area. They fly on warm evenings at dusk. The adults do not feed but they mate in trees and the females will lay their eggs in the turf below the trees. The best time for Merit applications is during European chafer egg laying so for those properties that have had a history of European chafer damage you should consider applying Merit anytime between now and August 1st. I have had a report from the Windsor area that Ataenius damage is starting to show up now on golf courses down there. Curative treatment may be warranted if you are finding more than 50 per 0.1 m2.
The cool temperatures have meant that broadleaf herbicides can still be applied. This has helped the lawn care industry and sod growers because all the rain and wind have delayed these applications earlier this month. Now is also a good time for core aeration provided we do not get really hot weather in the next week. Most soils have dried out sufficiently now to make coring possible.
There are just a few more spots available for the “Solving Turf Problems” workshop on July 11 but there is still room on July 12, 2000. We will start the day with a session in the field identifying turf diseases. We will move into the lab for the rest of the day to identify the diseases under the microscope. The limit is 20 people per day and the cost is $249. If you are interested in this workshop, phone my office for registration information at (519) 824-4120 x 2597.
Again, thanks for phoning the hotline for this week. The next hotline message will be recorded on Fri. June 30, 2000. – See more at: https://lawnsavers.com/turf-hotline-2000/turf-agrifax-week-13-2000-june-23-2000.html#sthash.dTNxSiCh.dpuf
