More Drainage....

 

Addressing the right rough along the cart path on 12.  Cart stakes are up for the entire season here since it stays wet.  Lack of sunlight and heavy soils leave this area less than desirable during the year.  This improvement will hopefully eliminate the stakes and improve the health of the rough.  We will assess how the 4 laterals do and possibly add more in the future if needed.  Being this area is pretty flat, we are limited in drainage without going to electric sump pumps.

Head Start....

 

Anything we can get done now, saves us later on.  Trying to start pulling cores on fairways and approaches now instead of early April before weather events.  By removing some thatch now, we will be able to verticut and topdress fairways in early April and get a lot done to fairways with minimal impact to the membership.  A dusting of snow is forecast for tonight, so most likely we will be holding off tomorrow and getting back at it on Wednesday if the weather cooperates.  

Drainage Beginning

 

While we had less than ideal weather this week, with our first significant snow of the season on Monday, it was a good time to do some out of the way drainage.  This area left of 13 path sees a lot of action as people bail out over here.  After heavy rains, this area usually has standing water after, but now that issue should be resolved.

We will be moving through the course and addressing areas that will make a significant impact immediately ahead of the golf course Master Plan process.

13 Tee Getting Ready

 

We popped the cover on the new tee on 13 and things look good.  Roots are established enough that we can give it a good roll to smooth it out before we put the cover back on.  A quick fertilizing and a fungicide treatment and we will cover again for another few weeks.  Our focus now is getting the remaining soil in to finish the berm along the fence and then do some hydroseeding and screening planting come April.

Tree Removal

 This rotted twin oak located to the right of 18 blue tee is finally being removed.  Each year, less and less of the tree leafed out and in 2022 most of the tree was dead.  The main reason was the relocation of the 18th tees 6 years ago and the disruption to the root system with the earth moving etc.  This tree served no strategic purpose and will not be missed.

Pictures Dont Lie

 I found this picture today in my archives of 10 green.  This was taken a few years ago during a thaw and freeze cycle.  Can you see where the sun/shade line is?   There is no snow or ice anywhere on the hole except in the back of the green that gets no sunlight until after 12 noon.  Luckily, no damage was done to the green from the ice, but the only solution is to remove trees left of the green to get more sunlight on the green.  The final solution is to relocate the green about 40 yards left and then remove the same trees to get sunlight on that green.  Tough location when most of the trees we need to remove are needed for screening and protection.

Undercover Update

 

We pulled the covers off 11 and both practice greens.  Pretty obvious the covers work by the green color and the growth of the greens.  Even better, if you look at the picture above, in the topdressed area the bentgrass is not 100% active and growing yet the poa is flourishing.  This picture is near the edge of the green on 11 where mower and roller traffic is heavy and usually thins during the summer.  Poa is starting to take over this area vs the bent.  Definitely can say our poa conversion is working and will continue it this spring.  Once poa populations reach 75% or greater, the thinning of this green from wear and tear should lessen significantly each summer.

 The picture above is the new practice green and the dots you see are the poa plugs we started incorporating 12 months ago.  Normally this would be signs of ball marks but this green is used for putting only.  The dots are almost in aeration patterns, which means we have been successful in working our poa plugs into the aeration holes.   We will get more aggressive on this green moving forward so it is the same as 11 and the other practice green.