Welcome to the “Turf Management Updates” sponsored by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs. This message is for the week of Aug. 30 – Sept. 6, 2007.
Weather
We have just emerged from another hot, hazy humid period when thundershowers blew through this part of the province. The cool temperatures are a relief, but the heat will return briefly on Sun. and Mon. The humidity isn’t supposed to be too high however. There has been some relief from the dry conditions. Most areas of the southwestern part of the province had rain either last Fri. or Sat..
Diseases
The rain coupled with the heat of the last few days brought on a flurry of dollar spot. Annual bluegrass is very weak at the moment and the rain and the heat seem to have spawned a lot of anthracnose basal rot. The other perennial problem has been take-all patch. Fairy ring on golf course greens seem to be more noticeable at the moment. Usually a shot of nitrogen will help mask the symptoms. The rust that appeared a few weeks ago doesn’t appear to be getting any worse. If you have disease problems that you can’t identify, please send a sample into the GTI Turf Diagnostics for an accurate diagnosis.
Insects
Now that we have had some pretty substantial rains, it is obvious that there have been insects feeding away on dormant turf. I am pretty sure that most of the damage has been caused by hairy chinch bugs and bluegrass billbugs. Because temperatures have been warmer than normal, the hairy chinch bug adults are still in the turf. The damage is over though and there is probably no justification for treating at the moment.
There have also been lots of adult sod webworms flying around. The damage from this insect usually becomes evident in mid-late September. Judging by the numbers of adults, there is potential for damage from sod webworms later this month.
Over the last week there has been an explosion of European crane fly adults flying. I checked back for the same period last year and we had not seen any European crane fly adults. This is definitely much earlier than normal. There are still lots of leatherjackets and pupae in the soil, so there will be more adults emerging over the next week at least. Based on some of the insecticide trial work that we have done, the best time to treat is next spring. This makes it important to make note of areas with large numbers of adult crane flies and to monitor them next spring to determine if treatment is necessary.
Renovation
Now is the time to renovate those turf areas that have been damaged by insects or disease. The approach you take for renovation will depend on the extent of the damage. If the damage is minimal (small fist sized dead areas) on a Kentucky bluegrass stand, simply fertilizing the lawn will promote turf recovery. Applying 0.5kg of nitrogen per 100m2 now and the same amount in late fall will do the trick.
On areas that have greater damage and the grass species isn’t predominantly Kentucky bluegrass then overseeding and fertilizing will be necessary. The overseeding window in this part of the province (southwestern Ontario) is mid-August to mid-September. Ensure good seed to soil contact by raking bare areas. On larger properties and sports fields, core aeration will help insure seed to soil contact. Seeding rate for overseeding sports fields with perennial ryegrass should be 4 kg/100m2. It is essential to keep the seedbed moist. This may require watering up to 3 times a day until seeds have germinated and seedlings are well established. After seedlings have been up for a couple of weeks, an application of fertilizer of 0.5 kg of nitrogen per 100m2 will help the seedlings get established.
The Sports Turf Association is holding their annual field day in the City of Hamilton on Thursday, September 13, 2007. This is always a very informative day and this year the feature speaker is Pamela Sherratt, Sports Turf Extension Specialist at Ohio State University.
Again, thanks for phoning the turf management update for this week. The next report will be recorded on Thurs. Sept. 6, 2007.
– See more at: https://lawnsavers.com/turf-hotline-2007/turfgrass-management-agriphone-for-august-30-2007.html#sthash.LJJiwUKh.dpuf
