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Weather Update
Finally some sunshine and warmer temperatures returned to northern and central Illinois last Friday June 8.
Thus ended a string of 17 straight days in Chicago where the daily high temperature didn't reach 70° F.
Also, it rained on eleven of those 17 days, and was mostly cloudy the whole time.
Not good growing weather for creeping bentgrass, as I observed many discolored, thinning bent patches on greens and fairways.
Many turf mangers think this is a type of leafspot, but I think it is entirely a weather x genotype interaction (Pete Dernoeden has also written several articles about this phenomenon).
Some bent clones turn yellow or orange colored, while others turn more red to reddish brown.
Unfortunately, when the weather changes around these parts, it is a big change.
The forecast for the next few days calls for hot and humid conditions, with temps in the upper 80s north to low or mid 90s in central IL.
I wasn't looking forward to my trip to Tulsa this week for the OPEN, but I guess it isn't going to make any difference heat-wise! At least Tulsa missed the severe tropical storm that dumped 36 inches of rain on Houston area and similar heavy amounts to points east of there.
Diseases
With the extended cool, wet conditions of the last two weeks, we did see a few outbreaks of Microdochium patch (caused by M. nivale, the pink snow mold fungus).
Most broad spectrum fungicides (eg iprodione, chlorothalonil, azoxystrobin, dmi's) will control this disease, but when it is cold and cloudy for several days in a row, the symptoms will be very slow to heal - and could make one think that their treatments aren't working.
Also, with the influx of warmer air and some sunshine, this particular pathogen should cease activity anyway, and injured areas should heal fairly quickly.
With this change in the weather pattern, if you had some Microdochium patch and you treated with a fungicide that also controls dollar spot, it may have been a wise (or fortuitous) choice! Dollar spot starts working in late spring when temperatures are in the low to mid 80s during the day and mid to upper 60s at night (esp. with heavy dew formation).
When we had the short hot spell in mid-May, there was some dollar spot active, so this heat coming in now may fire up the disease again.
I suspect there is also a chance of seeing some higher temp diseases in central IL, but it may take a few days to accumulate enough heat to get any Pythium or Rhizoc growing.
Insects
Lepidopterous larvae (cutworms, armyworms, sod webworms) should start appearing on fine turf areas soon.
I have seen some birds pecking at greens in the last few days, but we couldn't find the larvae to see if it was black cutworms they were after.
Also, I haven't heard many comments about Ataenius beetle adults visiting greens; maybe that would be another bug to keep an eye out for - Ataenius larvae usually cause visible damage in July or early August, so egg laying time should be around now (?).
Weeds
The wet, cool, and cloudy weather may have favored the growth of clover in bent/Poa fairways.
Be careful treating with herbicides this week, however, because there is more chance of phytotoxicity to the turf with this heat and humidity.
On the moss front - I continue to see problems that look like they will be very difficult to control.
Various treatments seem to discolor or weaken the moss, but is seems to come back fairly well.
A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned a new control option called Terracyte
which looked like it had some promise.
But I guess the jury is still out.
Some areas that we treated with Terracyte at Aurora CC have recovered somewhat, and it looks like multiple treatments will be required to take out the moss.
Please give me an update on how your moss controls are working this spring (if anything is working! - tough weather to inhibit moss).
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