Fixing the drainage is the first part. It makes it mowable and playable. To really make it weather proof, allow the fairway to get firm, make the ball bounce, keep thatch under control, and combat earthworm castings, we had to implement this program on about a third of our fairway acreage (initially...since then we have expanded the program to all the fairways, we just treat some with a little more sand)
We attempted heavy and often. This obviously is an inconvenience to members, but the long term payoff was going to worth it. Mostly, golfers have been happy that their balls bounce instead of plugging.
One can see the top inch and a half of sand and how free draining that is. Below that is the 2 inch thatch layer, and below that is the native clay soils.
In 2006 we applied 1400 tons of sand to our fairways, which equates to a little over an inch of elevation change.
In 2007, we added more fairways to the program. Because of the drought conditions during the season, we were unable to put out as much topdressing as we did in 2006. We were in the 600 ton range adding about a 1/4".
In 2008 , we added all the fairways to the program with about 900 tons of sand added to the fairways. we use a new process for this now:
First we spread sand on the fairway and using only solid tines (no pulling of cores) we aerate over it.
The picture below illustrates the sand falling into the holes. A drag mat is then used to work the rest of the sand in. In one operation we have completed topdressing and aeration in a very convenient manner.
Simple cleanup:
