Why Offseason Aeration Happens at Myrtle Beach Golf Courses

You see it frequently with Grand Strand golf courses – typically on the front end of summer as they’re regrouping after a busy spring season, and also in August as courses are preparing for fall play. You arrive at the course, and discover the greens (and often the fairways) have been “punched” with small holes filled with sand. Your putting game now faces a new challenge, as the quick greens you played just weeks before now have a distinctly different speed and texture.

Welcome to aeration season.

It’s a temporary inconvenience, to be sure. But we’ll emphasize “highly necessary” along with “temporary,” because it ensures the great course conditions you’ve come to expect throughout the year – and particularly during Myrtle Beach’s peak seasons – are in place for your next golf getaway.

To ensure those optimal conditions, aeration does three things:

1. It creates a quicker short-term path for the playing surface’s key nutrients (water, oxygen, fertilizer) to nourish the soil and promote better long-term conditions. The small holes left during the aeration process are usually then filled with top dressing, a sand/soil mix that lets water seep into the roots.
2. It removes thatch, the organic material that accumulates between the soil and the greens’ surface. Excess thatch runs the potential of “choking off” the playing surface; removing it lets the playing surface breathe easier, as oxygen now has a more open pathway to the roots.
3. It lessens compaction, a natural byproduct of the many thousands of rounds played on Myrtle Beach-area golf courses and the heavy foot traffic they bring to the greens each busy season.

And when we talk about “temporary” post-aeration conditions, it usually means it will be about 10 days (give or take a few) before the playing surface fully returns to its pre-maintenance levels. And playing conditions improve steadily within that time frame.

If you’re not sure how aeration will impact your summer golf plans, just call ahead to the course you want to play. They’ll tell you the dates involved so you can plan accordingly.