Thursday, May 24, 2012

Wetting Agents

Trying to find something to write about for this weeks post and thought since I have been hand watering everyday for the last two days you may find some information about what we applied to the greens over the last 2 nights


The extremely dry, warm and very windy weather that we are having is really drying out the golf course and in order to help move water into the soil profile we make use of wetting agents to help.  What happens in the soil, especially the greens and tees since the soil profile is primarily sand, a coating can developed around the soil particle that inhibits water from attaching to it and will not allow the soil to wet.  You can see in the photos that the water tends to run off the surface and not infiltrate into the drier areas.  And when you pull a core sample from this area there is very little moisture in the sample.





Over the last two nights I sprayed a a wetting agent on the greens that we tried last year to help alleviate the water repelling off the soil and allow the soil moisture to be more uniformity  throughout the soil without holding to much water keeping the surface soft and wet.  Asking a lot of one product but from the results I noticed last year on the few greens that we tried it on I was happy with the results.  Today, after a good watering in the product last night we worked on any additional dry areas on the greens.  You can see in this photo the differance in which there is much less runoff and the soil core actually has some moisture in it.












There are many different types of wetting agents that I use on the golf course for different situations and issues.  The tees are all sand and do not hold any water in this case I use a product that actually holds the water near the surface.  This product would not be a good choice on the putting greens since it could lead to a softer surface and not allow the water to move readily through the profile.  But in the case of the tees  it works fairly well in keeping some water where the roots are to reduce running the irrigation for long times.  I have yet to apply any wetting agents to the fairways and have plans to do so next week but in this case I use a different product that allows the water to move through the profile.

Wetting agents do not make our job easier but does aid us in applying water in the extremely dry, warm weather we are experiencing now. Allowing for the water to get into the soil profile to keep the turf much healthier without keeping the surface too wet.





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