New Fairway Bunker Constructed on the Left Side of 17

A new bunker was constructed on the left of the 17th fairway.  This large bunker will protect the left side of the hole as the new tees will be shifted to the right of their current location, making the hole a slight dogleg right.  The old bunker on the right will be made into a grass swale as now the oak tree will protect that side of the fairway from the new tee location.

Gallery For the NJSGA Mid Am

Our resident coyote taking in the Mid Am today.

Aerial Showing Before and After Renovation Work

You will see some of the most recent renovation work on 8,13,14,15 and 16 from the past year in both pictures.

Hydroject Application To Greens

This is our last hydroject application to greens before the busy weeks ahead.  We have a Labor Day Tournament on Saturday, the NJSGA Mid Am next week, followed by the club championship for the following 2 weekends.  This application will help smooth the greens from our recent aerification.

New Forward Tee Construction on 13

With the black tee just recently built, we are now building the new forward tee left of the current tee.  This will offer a better angle to play the hole.  You will notice the large area in front of the tees that we killed off is now completely dead and has been over seeded with fine fescue.  This will give us ample time to get it grown in before the cold weather.  The rest of the 13th tee complex will be constructed in mid to late November once the 17th hole is completed.

18th Hole Rerouting Almost Done

By next week, we should have most of the 18th hole renovation completed.   We are targeting to open by Labor Day weekend.  We are hoping to have all bunkers and mounding sodded next week, then we start putting in the road and removing the remaining fairway sod.  We have gotten a lot accomplished in the last few weeks considering the weather etc..

Just Another Monday at Arcola

With temperatures in the mid 90s, it was a busy Monday.  We got all the greens aerified and dryjected, fairways were starting to be aerified, we moved 12,000 sq ft of fairway sod on 18, we killed off 2 acres of rough to convert to fescue and we have been working on fairway bunkering on 18 as we rebuild the hole.  While the weather has been difficult of late, the course remains in good condition and we continue to make good progress on rerouting the 18th hole.  Kudos to my staff.

New 18th Tee Complex Progressing

With 3 truckloads of sod already laid and the berm planted by the storage building, we are nearing completion of the tee complex.  Monday we will be sodding the tee tops, then doing some detail work around the tees and we have about 5 pallets of rough sod left to lay out and we can just about call this part of the renovation finished.  With the extreme dry weather and lack of rain, this is not the ideal time to lay sod but it is good for getting work completed.  This coming week we are getting in fill needed to create the mounding and bunkering out in the fairway landing area.  The week of August 17th, we have our sod contractor coming in to relocate the fairway sod to match the new fairway lines.

Battling Through The Dry Weather

With the hot and dry weather of late, construction has been a challenge with dust and dirt so dry that it is hard to shape and finish.  This week we have at least 2 truckloads of sod coming along with 15 spruce trees that will be planted to hide our cold storage building.  Lets hope for some much needed rain before then.

18th Tees Progressing

This is the view of the new 18th hole alignment behind the 15th green.  In a matter of less than 2 weeks, we got all the trees removed, hauled dirt in to build 5 tees, installed the majority of the irrigation and constructed a new cart path, all while battling through a heat wave.

Get Ready For the Heat

Sun setting on another hot day.  Next 5 days will be extremely hot and dry.  We will not be raising mowing heights as of yet, but we will be cutting back on double and triple cutting and rolling to get us through the next week or so.

Rerouting the 18th Hole

We started breaking ground on a new 18th tee  complex that will now make the hole a dogleg to the right instead of  a straightaway hole.  The hole will play 450 from the black, 425 from the blue  and 385 from the whites.  It will be a much more demanding tee shot.  By relocating the tees, we can now push our driving range tees back to 315 yards from end to end when we rebuild the range this fall.

Building A New 10th Tee

With the clubhouse renovation going on and the addition of the building, we needed to raise the grade behind the new piece about 6 feet to get grades to meet.  We basically had to rebuild the 10th tee and have it done in 3 days for the Invitational.   We sodded it on Tuesday and had members playing on it on Friday.

Poor Drainage = Ice Damage

This is the 15th fairway and notice a few weeks ago where the water sat after a heavy rain.....that is where our winter ice damage is.  We will be removing trees and installing fairway drainage over the next few weeks to help prevent this from happening again.

New Bunker Added to the Front of 8 Green

We replaced the penal knob in front of the 8th green today with a new bunker.  The approach will now wrap around both sides of the bunker.

New Greenside Bunkers on 13

The large single bunker that fronted the 13th green is now 2 smaller bunkers with a walk way through them.  Next week we will have the fairway expansion finished and we are also expanding the green behind the bunkers to offer more pin placements.

Aerification Completed on Greens This Week

Despite cold temperatures, the greens were aerified and deep tines with 5/8" regular tines and 3/4" deep tines.  The newly installed XGD greens could not be aerified yet since the sod on the drain laterals did not root in from last November yet.  We are doing our first dryject on greens this coming Monday.

Pushing the Envelope

While we have not had ideal weather this entire spring, we are continuing to make good progress with our renovation work.  Here we are tarping our new fairway expansion on the 13th hole in advance of the rain so we can continue to lay sod after.

At Least Another Week to Go

#4 green pictured is the only green that has no snow on it.  All the other greens on the course for the exception of the practice green have anywhere from 3-6" of snow on them with a little ice layer underneath.

New View From New Tees #5

We have greatly improved the view of NYC with some tree removals near our shop this winter.  Now on a clear day you can see the entire skyline.

Construction Underway on 14 Tee

Today we started working on the new 14th tee complex.  Since we cleaned the snow off after each storm, it helped the tee thaw out earlier than expected so we can get to work.  As you can see in the background much of the area is still significantly snow covered.

Pushing to Get Work Done

With the long winter persisting, we cleaned the snow off the old cart path on #4 and added all new stone for the base.  This is one less thing we will have to do once the snow melts and we can get back on the course.

Clubhouse Footings Being Poured Today

With all the challenges so far with the building expansion, they finally got good weather to pour the footings yesterday.  Now the project should start churning along.

Recycling

All the concrete that was removed from the clubhouse renovation, our old asphalt paths and our old retaining walls from our ponds are all being crushed into a recycled product that can be used for cart paths and path bases.  The cost to crush all the material is about 1/4 of the cost if we were to purchase all the material we will have at the end to use.

What Are People Thinking

This past Saturday, this driver was looking for a birthday party in Paramus and wound up on our 12th hole buried.  Considering the cart path was drifted over from all the heavy winds of late, it was amazing that she made it this far out on the course.  We had to use our bulldozer to make a road to get the tow truck out to her.

Checking for Ice Buildup

With a month of snow cover already, we shoveled down to the green surfaces and found no ice which is good news.  With more inclement weather on its way we will continue to monitor conditions on the greens for the next 2 weeks.

The Winter Blues

Tough to keep the crew motivated this winter with the constant cold and snowy weather.  In another few weeks we will be wishing we had time to take a rest when everything melts and we are going full bore.

Nothing Much to Report Here

For those of you who decided to head south this winter, here is what you have missed so far this winter!  For the rest of us, we are all pretty much getting sick of the same forecast every week....cold and snow!  For the exception of some tree work done here and there, no progress has been made on the golf course renovation work since before Christmas.  I am hoping for a warm and dry spring since we have a lot of work left to do before the season gets going.