Virtually all of the damage was to Poa annua . With the LPGA Championship only 40 days away, we had our work cut out for us. With this background, here's the story of how we quickly brought these greens back from the dead. The first step in any recovery program is to convince yourself that the grass is dead. After all, winter injury associated with ice sheet cover and crown hydration can be deceiving.
Roots can look white and healthy.
The grass even retains some amount of green color coming out of winter, and many golf course superintendents believe the grass will come back. They think it just can't be hurt that badly. After the first few warms days, however, damaged plants attempt to function but soon wilt and begin to decay. After consulting with our regional USGA agronomists, Stan Zontek and Keith Happ, any optimism we had was dashed. We felt that if we did not disrupt the surface of the greens too much with the renovation process, we probably could provide a satisfactory surface for the event, even though the turf cover might be thin.