Over the weekend, it snowed roughly 8 inches, and then rained 9mm on top of it. The rain mixed with the snow to create an ice layer on some greens. The reason that ice is bad on grass, is that it limits the "breathing" of the plant, causing a Carbon Dioxide buildup.
The greens have 2 types of turf species in them. Creeping Bentgrass and Annual Bluegrass. Bentgrass can last 60 - 90 (sometimes 120) days before it starts to die from the buildup of gas. Annual bluegrass can only last about 30 days. Since the bentgrass is more tolerable than the annual bluegrass, if the annual bluegrass dies, it would be beneficial to help promote more bentgrass.
The two types of ice that can form are porous (or popcorn) ice, and solid ice. The porous ice has some air bubbles in it which usually allows the turf to last longer underneath as it can breathe.
 |
| Porous Ice (Popcorn Ice) |
 |
| Clear Ice |
I examined all the greens and decided to clear the greens with the most snow on them, since it would take longer for the ice to melt with the snow on it. The first step was to snowblow the affected greens on the course. As the snow was removed, we checked to see if there was ice. On every green we cleared there was ice, so I am glad we did that.
After the greens were cleared of snow, we then started applying dark green sand to help aid in the melting of ice. The dark colour of the sand pulls in the heat from the sun, and won't damage the turf, unlike ice melting salts for example.
 |
| Applying dark green sand |
 |
| Dark green sand on #8 green |
We then let the sand sit on the ice and snow to melt the ice and make it easier to break up and remove. Once the sand had sat there for a while with the sun hitting it, we then started the manual labour to break up the ice. We used ice chippers and shovels to remove as much as we could. It was a great workout. We did this for 3 days in a row with everyone that we had available to help out. The owners, the assistant superintendent, and general manager.
 |
| All hands on deck to remove the ice and snow |
As the ice melted, there was a considerable amount of water being left on the turf, which could freeze into ice again. We used the squeegees to push as much of it off as we could.
 |
| Pushing water off #4 green |
On the last day we brought out the aerator to help, as the manual chipping was taking a long time. The aerator worked okay. It made holes in the ice which is a good thing. It will allow the carbon dioxide to be released and for the turf to start breathing again. Some areas worked better than others, but it was all we had to do the job. The main goal was to just remove as much ice as we could.
 |
The result on #1 green after the aerator went
over it |
A few other things we tried were using the tractor with the box scraper to push as much snow as we could off the green. We won't know if it's beneficial or not until the spring. Another strategy that we came up with was applying a regular greens grade granular app on the green. Fertilizer is a salt, and salt melts ice. As long as you don't go above the recommended rate on the bag, you should be fine. Let's hope for positive results in the spring!
