Solid vs. Grooved front rollers on Greens?? Cancel The title field is required!

1. Steve Wilson

   

   0 posts
   
   7/17/2011 4:07 PM

   Hello all,
   
   I know this topic has probably been covered 1000 times on these forums, but for me it is easier to start a new discussion (and hope you reply) than try to search the forums.
   
   Anyway, we are in the dog days of summer where I am at in the Kansas City area with temps projected near 100 over the next week at least. I am growing penncross/poa (approx. 60/40) on old greens that have different construction methods (some pushup, some sand-based). When the weather gets like this and we start to worry about greens health, one of the things I am often curious about is using solid or grooved front rollers on our greensmowers.
   
   We typically raise our heights in the heat (currently up to .140") and typically keep grooved front rollers throughout the year. We walk mow some days (Deere 220E's) and ride others (Deere 2500 E's). Our membership is fairly understanding of slower greens speeds in weather like this but we still try to stay around 9' through our mowing and rolling practices.
   
   So to get to the questions....
   1.) For those of you who use or have used both grooved and smooth front rollers, what do your feel like the difference in height of cut needs to be to achieve the same green speeds (i.e. - do you need to set mowers on smooth front roller .010" lower to achieve same speed)?
   2.) Once you have a good feel for where your height needs to be set, do you feel there is still a benefit using smooth front rollers (less scalping, less stress, etc) versus just setting the mowers using grooved rollers up in height a little?
   
   I hope my questions make sense. I am just curious this time of year the best way to try to keep the greens healthy and still meet members expectations. Thanks in advance for any replies,
   
   Steve Wilson
   Meadowbrook Golf & Country Club
   Prairie Village, KS
   swilson@meadowbrookcc.org
   http://www.meadowbrookcc.org

   
   
   
   
2. Patrick Reinhardt

   

   0 posts
   
   7/17/2011 5:07 PM

   We use grooved rollers on our JD180s from September through mid-June. Mid-June through August we usually run solid rollers. We keep the same height (.120) unless we get into a lot of stress, then we will bump to .130. The greens are a little slower with the solid rollers since there is more leaf tissue left on the plants, but it takes a lot of the stress off the greens. We are growing A-1 bentgrass, and maintain speeds of 11-11.5 from fall to spring, and typically around 10.5 during summer. Greens haven't seen a roller since May, and won't see one again until we aerify. Every time we have used a Salsco roller during the summer we have had an almost immediate break out of pythium.

   
   
   
   
3. Steve Wilson

   

   0 posts
   
   7/17/2011 8:07 PM

   Patrick,
   
   Thanks for the information, much appreciated.
   
   Steve Wilson