|
Weather Summary and Outlook
Unseasonably warm and humid weather has returned to the upper Midwest the past few days, with some frequent heavy thunderstorms mixed in for good measure.
Heavy rains fell across parts of northern Illinois over the last two weeks, and as much as 12 inches of rain has fallen at some locations since early August.
Central Illinois has been a little warmer and dryer than the northern counties, with daytime temperatures frequently reaching the upper 80s to low 90s.
Fortunately, at this time of the year overnight temperatures are cooling into the upper 50s to low 60s, which reduces the stress on turf and slows down some of the fungal pathogens.
Frequent rains have put a "damper" on some fall construction and renovation projects around the Chicago metro area, including the 3-hole youth course that is under construction at Midwest Golf House.
Continued wet weather could delay the finishing/seeding date significantly, and an early winter or early hard freeze could cause problems for seedling survival - plus delay maturity and readiness of turf for play next spring.
Diseases
This warm and humid weather pattern also favors a return to activity of our old nemesis DOLLAR SPOT.
Dollar spot thrives when daytime temperatures are in the low to mid 80s, with warm and humid nights.
Turf that is low in N fertility also suffers more from dollar spot.
Since we are near the end of the season and have experienced frequent, heavy rains, N levels could be low for the shallow rooted turf.
Late season fungicide applications may not hold up very well either, depending on the timing of the application and rainfall.
Sudden heavy rains can dilute a recent fungicide application and shorten the control interval or effectiveness of the application quite substantially.
Although we haven’t heard of many major outbreaks, it is likely that Gray Leaf Spot on perennial ryegrass is active at this time as well.
Other leaf spots (eg Helminthosporium) on ryegrass, Kentucky bluegrass and Poa annua could also be active during this weather pattern, as well as anthracnose basal stem rot.
Most of the summer stress related problems we have endured should be clearing up by now, especially the high temperature fairy rings that have caused so many problems the last few years.
Insects
Our furry friends have begun the annual sod-mauling in search of tasty morsels of Japanese beetle grubs and annual white grubs.
Also, there are still some cutworm and sod webworm larvae around, but these guys should be pupating soon.
Ants and earthworm problems are back in the news, especially recent earthworm casting activity now that the soil temps have dropped.
So far, we haven’t heard of any more gypsy moth problems in the northern or western suburbs, but assume these pests are still around (asian long-horned beetle also).
Weeds
Cooler temps and frequent rains are bringing out the autumn broadleaf parade, including plantains, clover, knotweed, purslane, etc etc.
It was a fairly productive year for crabgrass, goosegrass, quackgrass, and nutsedge as well - all of which love the heat.
Moss and algae are continuing problems, especially algae that has moved into thinned, heat stressed turf following the frequent rain showers.
It is time to get out the core cultivation or deep tine machines, and the topdressing gear to cover up the algae and stimulate some new growth on stressed turf (don’t forget the fertilizer!!!).
Those of you with fall construction/renovation projects: please pass along an update as to how the projects are progressing; we will give an overview of progress in a future update.
Send info to Randy Kane.
THANKS!
YOUR FEEDBACK OF OBSERVED PEST PROBLEMS IS IMPORTANT
Please respond with your observations to pestalert@interactiveturf.com so we can build our pest activity data base and report those pest outbreaks back to our readers.
|
