Compacted soil, created from foot traffic, weather and other factors, reduces oxygen levels in the soil and can inhibit water getting to turf roots.
All of this compacting and organic matter can also make for a softer golf course because it's unable to drain water and push new turf to the surface. So, golf course superintendents aerate so you have a better golf course. They can do that with a variety of methods, but the general idea is to either make punch marks in the soil with rolling spikes or using equipment to create varying size soil cores that are pulled out of the ground.
These holes allow for excess moisture to evaporate and better chemistry in the soil to promote healthy turf growth. Superintendents don't always aerate the same areas. Sometimes, they do greens, others tees, and sometimes still, fairways. They can do a combination. They could stagger the approach. That is left to the superintendent, whose job it is to figure out what gets aerified and when and using what method.
Aeration schedules and timing can vary around the country, as well course to course, depending on the soil, the traffic, the cost, the kind of grasses used, weather and more.
Despite its documented benefits, aerification, without question, can be stressful on turf when done under environmental pressures such as heat and shade, or when done to turf that is in poor health to begin with. In most parts of the country, all of those factors need to be considered during the most popular time for aerification, which is late summer and early fall. This is especially problematic in late summer, when root systems are weak.
A heaved turf will take a few weeks to re-root and, in the meantime, will require more water, making the surface softer than it was before aerification. Aerification is also stressful because of the sand commonly used to topdress the green and the cleanup required.
Think about walking barefoot on beach sand on an August day — the sand hurts your feet, so you wear sandals. Additionally, the sand must be worked into the holes to achieve the best benefits of core aerification. Sand is abrasive, and extreme care needs to be taken not to abrade the turf. Blowing and dragging large amounts of sand on the surface of the turf is necessary to fill the holes, but if done during stressful weather or too aggressively, such practices can lead to abrasion and physical damage.
The impact on green speeds must also be considered. More nitrogen is typically applied following aerification to get the holes to fill in quicker, which can reduce green speeds for three to five weeks or longer.
Applying additional nitrogen to speed recovery might have an unintended negative impact too. For example, the stimulated grass may require more frequent mowing and rolling to obtain targeted speeds, but mechanical damage may result from that increase in maintenance, especially if there is a significant amount of sand in the leaf canopy.
Greens injured by late-summer aerification will likely remain in poor condition until late autumn. Lifting and other mechanical injuries may also result in slow recovery, and greens may remain weak until the following spring, sometimes until April or May.
In my career, which has included more than 1, golf course visits, I estimate I have seen more than 80 occurrences of greens hurt by late-summer aerification in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast regions. In years such as , aerification in late August and September caused notable damage, regardless of which method hollow tines vs. Even waiting until early October is no guarantee for success: was unusually hot and wet, and those environmental stresses resulted in extremely slow recovery from aerification.
Another consideration at that time of year is the shortening of daily sunlight, which can lead to frosts, which slow turf growth significantly. In some years, August may be a great time to aerate, but it only takes one event of extreme turf stress to cause superintendents to rethink when and how they aerify. The injury from aerification in and other years varied among courses and from green to green on those courses. Many times, shaded greens or greens that lacked air movement were most severely damaged.
There is not a single recipe for successful aerification timing and methods that is applicable to every golf course. Some golf courses experience little golf from Halloween until late spring, for example, and these courses potentially have fewer issues with aerification timing because they have more flexibility.
Some golf courses have a core group of 20 to 30 players who will play almost every day of the year, including in winter, as long as they can access the golf course. Every course is unique in regard to golfing schedule, budget, labor, grass species and growing environments.
For many, you can add seasonal concerns, a heavy tournament schedule, or the agendas of club professionals or owners to the mix. A necessary evil: Aerification keeps turf healthy and playing well. GCM staff photo. I agree that mid- to late August and early September do provide a good time for quick healing. However, if the weather is not ideal at the time of aerification, as well as over the next few weeks during recovery, greens will not heal as quickly as they would during favorable weather.
Do you trust the weather forecast? The Toro ProCore is one of the most popular aerators used in the industry. The tires live inside the machine behind the tines, which allows a wider surface area for aerating some 48 inches wide. TrueCore, another piece of tech implemented by Toro, allows the machine to hug the ground as it passes over green contours. The outcome? Consistent hole depth, which keeps the green evenly aerated throughout. James Colgan is an assistant editor at GOLF, contributing stories for the website and magazine on a broad range of topics.
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