Greens Aeration

It has officially started as of 05:30 today.  There is a misconception out there that this is a Superintendent's favorite time of year.  We finally get to relieve any compaction, get water moving again and also remove some thatch.  While that is all true, I think the preparation that goes in to making aeration successful is what makes this my favorite time of year.

I aerate once a year and I want to get all the benefit I can with as little to no disruption as possible.  I start thinking in November as to what my problems were and what I hope to accomplish the following year.  After that, I base all fertility applications based on the date of aeration.  It really is quite a bit of prep that is involved for just three days of work.

All the prep in the world though can't stop a machine from breaking down or an employee calling sick.  Coincidentally, before 3 years ago, we would always have issues on the lake course which had always been day two.  I finally said, "F it. Adam we are doing the lake from now on first".  Since then we haven't had any issues, but my fingers are still crossed!