If we thought the interesting weather would stop before the end of February we would be wrong! With the first half of the month giving us a winter’s worth of snow, the second half of the month was full of wild temperature swings and ultimately, a lot of rain! In less than a week, the snow banks that were at head height at the end of my driveway have disappeared. Apart from a brief dip in temperatures to begin March, the temperature trend appears stable. Most daily highs between 4 and 8 degrees and nightly lows hovering right around zero. This would be welcoming as temperatures dipping well below freezing as the turf has bared off can be harmful. Also avoiding daily highs creeping into the teens with the tarps still down can overheat the turf. As we get into March a plan will be made to determine when we pull the tarps from the greens and thinking about getting a mow on them. Still a good amount of time between now and then for things to change, as is common these days!
Our second batch of samples are growing in nicely. It would appear that the amount of time under snow and even some time spent under ice did not adversely affect the turf. Both of the samples from 9 and 18 are growing in well (Photos below taken from February 26th-29th.) Something to note as well would be the sample from 18 (Top right). Notice all of the fine, lighter colored shoots coming in; these are annual bluegrass. (bentgrass has a wider leaf that is a darker green). Annual Bluegrass, or poa annua, as we know does not handle winter as well as bentgrass. It is more susceptible to winter injury, in all forms, be it crown hydration, anoxia, plant desiccation, etc. Seeing the poa growing in healthy means the bentgrass populations are certainly healthy as well.
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