With the recent warm up, I have finally gotten outside to get a look at some of our turf. As expected, we have a decent crop of snow mold. While historically we don't get enough prolonged snow cover to worry about snow mold on a large scale, the past two winters have caused some grief. With today (February 17th) being the first real day of "open turf", we have to go back to early December to find the last day without substantial snow cover. This is well beyond the 60 days of snow cover usually required to have snow mold issues. Whether we have Gray Snow Mold or Pink Snow Mold is the question, but it is likely we have a little of both. Also likely is that they are purely cosmetic and the fungus did not make it to the crown of the plant and cause a lethal infection.
So what now? With the snow cover all but gone and freezing temperatures in the horizon, the fungus will stop actively growing until freezing temperatures subside. When the ground conditions warrant, will be making an early fungicide application to take care of the snow mold and some other likely spring diseases. Once the turf starts actively growing, it will simply grow through the cosmetic effects of the disease.
