[Joel_Stewart]

Aside from poor mowing habits, what are other reasons greens inadvertantly shrink?

Is it fair to say that most greens shrink in areas close to greenside bunkers?

[Patrick_Mucci]

Joel,

It's called, "minimum wage labor"

[Tom_Doak]

They're not going to get bigger, because to make them bigger someone would have to scalp down the grass, and that would look bad ... it might even cost you your job as a greens mower.  So they gradually get smaller every year.

Yes, too, they grow further away from bunkers due to employees taking a wide berth, and from "rounding in" the corners because it's easier to mow that way.

[rgkeller]

Bad superintendents.

[David_Tepper]

Does sand from bunker shots thrown onto greens and fringes have, over time, some part in shrinking greens and/or altering the contour of green surfaces?

[Don_Mahaffey]

rgkeller,
Yup, your right. I was waiting for someone to write that triplex mowers are the cause, so I could use my "guns don't kill people, people do" line. I'm a supt. and it's not PC to say anything negative about supers but if a course is losing green's area, then the super is to blame, pure and simple. My new course in Oregon had very cool greens with lots of nooks and crannies that had been lost. We walked mowed those areas, slowly taking down the height until we were at greens height. We triplex now, but we do the clean-up passes with a walk mower. The triplex never mowes anything but a straight line. We send out two guys, one on a triplex and one with a walker on a trailer and if they work well together we finish 19 greens in less then 3.25 hours. The key being the guy on the walker always gets the flag and moves any rakes so the triplex never stops. A simple system. My assistant marks the edges of the greens weekly with small white dots so we maintain a good edge. It's not that hard to keep green shapes. All it takes is some kind of decent system and some one in charge who thinks it's important and follows up.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

Don,
I couldn't agree more. Well said.

R.G. I'm hoping you were jsting on this one and simply forgot to use one of those smiley's, correct?

(Here is your out. I suggest you take it! In return, I hope to see you back the removal of the pond on #16! Do not disappoint me! )

[Joel_Stewart]

My new course in Oregon had very cool greens with lots of nooks and crannies that had been lost. We walked mowed those areas, slowly taking down the height until we were at greens height. We triplex now, but we do the clean-up passes with a walk mower.

Don:

How long did it take to restore the lost portion of the greens?  Our super wants to use the same strategy, taking it down a little at a time but he is also concerned about the condition of that grass, not being of the quality of the grass on the green.

[Joe Hancock]

So, if a club decides that they bit off more than they could chew with 10,000 sq. ft. greens, and decides for economic reasons they should wittle the greens down to 7000 or 8000 sq. ft., they need to fire their good super and go out and hire a bad super?  

Me? I'm just minimum wage labor....

Joe

[Patrick_Mucci]

Don Mahaffey,

Don't be so quick to assume blame.

Greens don't change their shape and size overnight.
Like tree growth the daily change is imperceptable to the naked eye, and as such, insidious.

Outsiders sometimes see the changes before those on site do.

It's like a parent and their young child, they don't see the day to day growth, but outsiders, who see the child every 3 or 4 months notice the change.

In the ultimate, you're not wrong, but, many or most supers inherit a green, not knowing its original dimensions.

Retaining the intended green configuration is often done with buried wires that can be charged to reveal the original, or agreed upon green lines.

In many cases, if the super discovered the shrinkage on greens he inherited, what are the chances that if he reclaimed the lost portions, that the membership wouldn't complain about the changes, not having a clue with respect to the restoration of the intended design  

[Don_Mahaffey]

Now Joe,
I know you well enough to know we think alike more often then not...I should have written..unintentionaly losing green area. It's one thing to shrink 'em because one wants to...quite another to do it unintentionaly

[Joe Hancock]

Don,

You know me well enough to know I was being my usual smart aleck self.

In a way, though, I wanted to make sure the paintbrushes we use here don't get too big.

It doesn't surprise me at all to hear that you are doing the right things in the right way. You understand the game better than most.

Joe

[Don_Mahaffey]

Patrick,
Yes the buried wire method is used alot. In my case we had pictures and an owner who knew the shapes and wished to recreate them. Regular marking of green's edges is one method used by a lot of supers, especially in areas fighting bermuda grass encroachment. The basic idea is taking the decison making out of the hands of the guy mowing and putting the responsibility on the super or assit. Whatever method is used, regular follow up is needed. A buried wire isn't going to set off an alarm if the green changes. Someone has to go out and hook up the wire tracer and mark the edges. If it isn't done on a regular basis, then it's only good for fixing the problem after it never should have become one.

Joel,
We started in Feb when the turf was dormant. We are bent/poa and the areas were in the close cut coller at about a half inch coming out of winter. Just started mowing it down a little at a time to keep the density and used a lot of topdressing. You can still see the turf in those areas looks a little different but it plays fine and wouldn't be noticable unless you were looking for it.

[rgkeller]

Don,
I couldn't agree more. Well said.

R.G. I'm hoping you were jsting on this one and simply forgot to use one of those smiley's, correct?

(Here is your out. I suggest you take it! In return, I hope to see you back the removal of the pond on #16! Do not disappoint me! )

Well, since Don the Super agrees with me and you agree with Don then you must agree with me.

[Top100Guru]

One theory is that super's sometimes lose the area's nearest the collars/fringes and then grow that grass longer to mask the problem of thinning grass and after you have changed super's over the years, no one really knows the original green dimensions, thus you end up with smaller greens...asl TD about what happened at Yeaman's......

[W.H. Cosgrove]

I love the idea of doing the cleanup pass with a walking mower.  We use triplexes at my home course and only do the cleanup pass three days a week to reduce the wear and tear around the edges.   We went through the process of reclaiming our greens about 5-6 years ago.  They had shrunk to little round blobs after 30 + years.

[Patrick_Mucci]

W H Cosgrove,

Why not get rid of the triplexes and eliminate all wear and tear on your greens ?

[A_Clay_Man]

How about the misguided desire to want smaller targets?

It may not explain why many get smaller, but, it sure does create a brick wall when attempting to return green sizes.

While it is limited, the general attitude, I hear, from  the "better" player, is to want them small. Especialy the Pro's or their assistants, who think that's what makes their course "better". Now that's subjectivity.

[paul cowley]

....in addition to improper mowing , sand splash from bunkers over time can cause an increase in slope which helps to reduce green size and pinable areas ...pebble beach is a good example of this.

[TEPaul]

"....in addition to improper mowing , sand splash from bunkers over time can cause an increase in slope which helps to reduce green size and pinable areas ...

PaulC:

The best examples of "turbo kick" slope over fronting bunkers due to excessive sand splash---perhaps 3-5 feet over the years--is Merion's #8 and #13 and PVGC's #17 to an extent. All those greens, when built, sloped from back to front into the fronting bunker. Now if the ball lands just over the front bunker it very definitely kicks across the green.

I don't mind this type of evolution at all and in a sense I think it's sort of poetic justice as players are capable of hitting their aerial shots so much higher these days than when those greens were built.

[Joel_Stewart]

The best examples of "turbo kick" slope over fronting bunkers due to excessive sand splash---perhaps 3-5 feet over the years--is Merion's #8 and #13 and PVGC's #17 to an extent.

Tom:
Did Fazio fix those bunkers?

[Jeff_Mingay]

Tom,

I agree. I love the evolved state of those bunkers/greens/golf holes you mention due to sand splash.

Researching and pondering over positive evolution has probably been most interesting to me in writing my forthcoming book. The answer to the question, when has evolution been positive?, is judgement call. Like the call Coore and Crenshaw made in regard to dealing with Riviera's evolved bunkers a few years ago, for example. As you know, they decided to reconstructed them in their evolved state.

As it relates to restorative-based work on classic golf courses, I think the call on how to deal with evolution is entirely based on the guiding principles of Golden Age golf architecture.

It's a very interesting topic.

[paul cowley]

TP.....agreed o flowing one , i was giving an answer to a technical question , albeit clinical , checking my own thoughts and passions at the threshhold framed by the asker.

 

[paul cowley]

....it's interesting to note that some prefer the evolved versions over the original designers intent .....a sometimes copied look the begs another swig thought or two.

[A_Clay_Man]

 The turbo kick slope, created by sand splash, only happens on bunkers that were flat to begin with, no? Just the opposite result is true on some of those steep grass walled Ross bunkers. Thinkiing of the front right bunker on the 4th hole at Beverly CC, pre-Prichard.

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