Drainage Improvement Already

The area to the left of the 17th fairway has been a nuisance for more than 9 years.  A simple 1/2" of rain would leave puddles in the area and we would have to stake it off and not mow it for a while.  After the installation of a sump pump and some drain lines in the rough the picture below shows the area the day after almost 4" of rain, not a single drop of water.  Even the dog fainted when she saw it!

The Proper Way to Hit Balls on the Range

The picture above sent to me from George Cultraro shows how to properly hit balls on the range to help protect the life of the range tee.  Taking divots in a sporadic fashion wastes usable space and limits recovery time.  Thanks for the picture GC!

And So It Begins...

Putting in a few drain lines on the 17th fairway on the left side and the rough.  Only way to move water out of this location is to use a sump pump since the nearby ditch is not deep enough and we need to get the laterals deep enough to not be effected by aerification and to get some of the ground water that we are fighting.  The 17th, 16th and 5th fairways will need wide spread drainage and a few other holes will need some supplemental. 

Fairy Ring

This is fairy ring, a fungus on our 15th fairway which so happens to be one of our experimental fairways.  The fungus usually shows up as dark green circles and certain types of fairy ring will turn brown and others will remain green.  These were non evident and then immediately turned brown as soon as the rain stopped and hot weather emerged.  The rings are already healing and next year we will know that this fairway will be susceptible to this and we will plan accordingly.

Bye Bye Oak Tree

The large oak by 1 tee that was hit by lightning last month is already showing signs of die back at the top of the tree.  From the magnitude of the lightning strike, it was evident the vascular system was fried and the tree would eventually die.  Structurally the tree is sound but we will remove it in the coming weeks.

Met Am Timeline

After Wednesday afternoon final prep, heavy thunderstorm hits the course

During Thursday stroke play, another storm rolls in and suspends play for several hours

Fridays match play portion is cancelled in the afternoon due to flooding

Saturday morning the staff comes in to torrential rains, staff stays for 10 hours to get course ready for play at 3pm.  No mowing done, but all bunkers repaired and all turf squeegeed. 

By Sunday afternoon a champion has been crowned and the tournament finishes on time.  For the exception of Saturdays washout, greens rolled between 12 and 13 every day regardless of weather.  A big thanks to my staff for going above and beyond the past 5 days.

Difficult Met Am So Far

We all know the dreadful weather we had before this week and now it has rained every day since Tuesday.  The crew has done a remarkable job keeping up with the weather.  We have started work at 4am the past few days, had volunteers come in to help and then had to bring the crew back twice to help squeegee water off playing surfaces after thunderstorms in the pm rounds.  So far the course is holding up but we have not been able to mow our wet fairways in the past few days and they are showing signs of water stress from constant puddles sitting on them.  You can only squeegee for so long until the grass will die off.  High temps are expected tomorrow so the rain tonight is only going to make things worse.  A big thanks to the crew for getting us to this point so far with 2 more days of matches to go.