Thursday, May 30, 2013

Course Update

The heat is forcing us to be conservative with the preparation of our greens.  The greens were mowed once this morning but were not rolled.  We plan on single cutting tomorrow followed by a single roll.  This should give us a little more green speed but nothing like our normal speed.  We have also cut back on growth regulators this week so the greens will recover quickly from Monday's scheduled aerification.

Just a reminder will will be aerifying all 27 greens on Monday with very small tines.  The greens are starting to grow more aggressively so they should recover quickly.

Saturday, May 25, 2013

A Very Wet Memorial Day Weekend

The past two days has seen its share of cold and wet weather.  The golf course has received approximately 1.6" of rain in the past 36 hours.  This rain has been a slow soaking rain.  Due to the excessive rain we have not been able to mow and roll like normal.  As a result the greens are significantly slower than normal.  It has also kept us from mowing rough as frequent as we would like.  As soon as things begin to dry up we should be able to return to our normal mowing schedule.

Friday, May 24, 2013

A "Rough" May

Every Spring we have a 2-3 weeks span where the rough seems to grow faster than we can cut it.  We are currently experiencing this at this time.  We currently have three rough mowers working 8-10 hours a day just to try and keep up with the rough.  With the amount of rain we received last night we currently are unable to cut the rough today.  It is going to get very difficult until it dries up enough to allow us to get the mowers out there.  We are doing the best we can and we will keep you posted with any updates.

Monday, May 20, 2013

A Day of Sand

Sand top dressing is being applied to the fairways, greens, and approaches. 250 ton of sand will be applied to the fairways by the end of the day tomorrow.

Friday, May 17, 2013

Hydraulic Leak #1 Falls Fairway

This morning we experienced a hydraulic leak on one of our fairway mowers. The area will soon begin to experience turf loss. Once we evaluate the significance of the turf loss we will determine how we address the area. This is unfortunate but these things are tough to prevent.

Rough Update

The Green Department is working frantically to get the rough back down to normal height of 2.5" following the US Open Qualifier.  All the rough has been mowed at 3" and we should start begin mowing at 2.5" later this afternoon.  Keep in mind it will take us a about two and a half day to get around the golf course.  We appreciate your patience at this time.


Tuesday, May 7, 2013

Busy Week Ahead

         This is going to be a very busy week for the Green Department.  We are still continuing to get the course prepped for the season.  We still have a few bare spots out there that need out attention.  This is the height of the Spring weed infestation.  We will be out spot spraying dandelions and clover for much of the week.  The entire rough on the Old Course was mowed and fertilized yesterday in preparation for the US Open Qualifier next week.  The opportunity to be a qualifying site for our National Championship is an honor.  It is our goal to challenge the best players in the area on our beautifully renovated championship golf course.  The rough this week will be allowed to grow more than our normal heights of cut because of this.  We will begin cutting the rough immediately following the completion of the qualifier.
       The condition of our fairway have never been better.  The fairway topdressing program that was started a few years ago has had a tremendous impact on the quality of the turf.  For this reason we are encouraging everyone to keep the carts in the fairways at all times while playing the golf course.  You should enter the fairways soon after leaving the tee area and return to the cartpath when you reach the cart signs instructing you to do so.  Our rough is still a work in progress.  We have continued to seed it to better varieties of grasses but this will take time.  At this point the fairways could handle the cart traffic much better than the rough.  I know this goes against the 90 degree rule that we all of been taught.  However, it is our goal to improve the quality of our rough and one of the best ways of doing this is by reducing cart traffic.