It takes about 2 to 3 days for us to fertilize all the fairways and rough using anywhere from 2.5 to 4 metric tonnes of fertilizer. Ideally, you want to fertilize in the spring when soil temperatures have risen to around 55 degrees F (or 10 degrees) and the turf has just started its first growth cycle of the season. That way there is sufficient nutrients available for uptake for development of new tissue. We were late by a couple weeks mostly because of the weather and other matters kept us from fertilizing any sooner.
Spreading Fertilizer on 9 Rough
This particular application has the analysis of 21-3-21 (FYI the numbers on a fertilizer bag represent the percentage of Nitrogen, Phosphorous, and Potassium a.k.a NPK. They don't add up to 100% since NPK are only the individual elements of the compounds that make up the whole fertilizer product). We apply at a rate ranging from .5lbs to 1lbs of actual N per 1000 sqft (another FYI: actual N is calculated by taking the weight of the bag multiplying it by the the number representing nitrogen on the bag and dividing by 100. For e.g. 21-3-21 comes in 55lbs bag so: 55 x 21/100 =11.55 lbs of actual N in one bag. At a rate of 1lbs/1000sqft one bag of 21-3-21 can be applied to an area of 11,500 sqft. This same calculation can be done for Phosphorous and Potassium as well.) After we have decided on a rate we need to calibrate the tractor spreader (and walk behind spreader) to achieve the desired rate. We use a big bag and run the tractor spreader for a set time at a set speed and then weigh the fertilizer collected. We do this over and over until we have the desired setting. That is stuff is probably only interesting to me but it applies to any rate calculation for any granular fertilizer so feel free to use it for your yard.
The biggest hurdle we have faced recently has been the cost increase of fertilizer by 40%. A couple ways to control cost is to use different fertilizer types. More expensive fertilizers have more nutrients and/or different nutrient formulations (e.g. methylene urea's) than a cheaper brand with the same NPK analysis. There is a trade off with using cheaper formulations and usually this is the length of time the fertilizer works (i.e. a fertilizer with a higher percentage of quick release Nitrogen is cheaper than a product with more slow release) and the compounds used in creating the fertilizer are usually higher in something called the "salt index" which can have deleterious effects on the turf. The other more obvious way to deal with cost increase is to fertilize less area. We are doing both when we fertilize. Those rough area with an increasing population of clover are areas which have not seen a high quality fertilizer or, in some cases, any fertilizer for a few years.
Our next major fertilization will take place in late summer/early fall when the turf enters its second major growth cycle before going dormant. The analysis will be similar with more micro nutrients and a different Nitrogen source which will still be available in the early next spring when soil temperature start to climb.
There is way more information to cover with respect to fertilizing and plant nutrition but I can tell peoples eye's are glazing over so I'll leave it there. Click the following link and read what the USGA had to say about the greens at the US open and see if the first paragraph sounds like any other place you might know of.
http://www.usga.org/news/2010/June/Beauty-In-Eye-Of-Beholder/
