On The Course April 29th

It is starting of cool this morning but should begin to warm up as the day goes on.  We received about .2 inches of rain yesterday which wasn't enough to make the course wet but maybe just a little soft in areas.  This morning the guys will be rolling greens and raking the bunkers after yesterdays rain.  Javier will be resetting tees and the cups will be changed. 

On The Course April 28th

We are very busy this morning with our first walk mow and roll of the year.  The greens are very firm this morning and should be rolling well today.  So far the weather has been alright this morning but there are some lite showers floating around the area.  Atleast we did not receive the cold temps that were forecasted for this morning.  The course will be reset this morning and we will be raking out the bunkers.

On The Course April 25th

We have been workin on some of the Muskrat tunnels along #7 pond

We had a little rain roll through overnight and it appears right now most of it has past. There is a chance of storms popping up throughout the day today. We are going to continue to work on spraying bunker banks today. Brandon was able to get most of the course done over the last couple of days and should finish the bunker banks today. He was also able to boom spray some herbicide on some rough areas on the back nine. Fernando and I were able to get most of the native between #3 and #4 flail mowed yesterday. The process is a little slow but the result looks really good.

Greens were mowed with walk mowers yesterday and they are starting to roll better each day. Today we will be rolling greens and checking pin locations. We will be mowing rough, collars and approaches. Jason is going to start to raise and level irrigation heads on the front nine tees. We have most of the stump holes seeded and covered with erosion fabric. The erosion fabric will help with establishment of the seed and I hope will deter carts from driving through them. Fernando and Roque will be working on sodding the areas where the crew has fixed some of the Muskrat damage.

Sheldon is going to continue aerifying fairways with the Vertidrain. He was able to get 3, 4 and 12 fairways done yesterday. Today he will be working on 13, 18 and 16 fairways. The Vertidrain is able to punch a 1/2 inch hole 7 to 8 inches into the ground which will help with getting our rooting depth a little deeper on the fairways. By getting deeper rooting in combination with some our other cultural practices we want to try to keep the fairways drier throughout the season. It is by no means a one and done process but as we continue this procedure over the next few years I think we can maintain better fairway conditions.

We mowed some of the Native area on #3 and #4 yesterday

Brandon has been working on getting the dandelions sprayed

We have seeded some stump holes and covered them with erosion mat to help with germination and establishment

On The Course April 24th

Sheldon will continue to work on aerifying fairways with the Vertidrain

 This week will be working on a lot of different projects throughout the golf course. Sheldon is working on aerifying the fairways with the deep tine Vertidrain. It is a slow process but he has finished 1, 9 and 2 fairways. He will be working on 3, 4 and 12 today. Yesterday the crew started to edge some cart paths during our morning frost delay. Troy was able to get all of the greens sprayed yesterday with some fertilizer and our summer patch disease preventative. Brandon worked on getting most of the bunker banks on the front nine sprayed with herbicide and fertilizer. He will continue to work on the rest of the bunker banks this morning. Jason fertilized the front nine tees and check all of the irrigation heads on those tees. He will be working on the back nine tees today and will be checking more irrigation heads.

Today we are going to be mowing greens with walk mowers for the first time this season. We have been using triplex mowers to this point to help with labor and have been keeping the height of cut a little higher to prevent early season stress. The walk mowers are set up slightly lower than the triplex mowers and we will be running the groomers on them at half the height of cut to help clean up the bentgrass that is laying down. We have seeded some stump holes and covered them with erosion fabric. Please avoid these when driving carts off the path. We are going to continue to hit from the turf portion of the range tee today and will look at covering the tee again next week.

We will be mowing some native areas today with the flail mower. We only have a small area left between #2 and #7. The areas are looking pretty clean right now and we will be looking at trying to get through the rest of the course over the next couple of weeks. Please keep carts out of these areas at all times.

Edging cart paths yesterday during the frost delay

Tom Hoverson dropped off the Columnar Oaks that will be planted along the main drive

On The Course April 20th

We have some light frost on the course this morning but it should burn off pretty quickly. We are going to be rolling greens this morning and setting the course up for play. We have opened the turf portion of the range tee for the weekend. Depending on weather conditions over the next couple of weeks we might be covering the tee occasionally to help with growth. The crew will be mowing fairways, collars and approaches today. Sheldon will be out on the rough mower getting some of the larger areas mowed.

We have aerified a couple of the fairways this week with our Vertidrain machine. It is a solid tine and disruption of the fairway is pretty minimal. We added some more sand to several bunkers this week and will finish the rest up next week. We will continue to monitor the sand depths and make any necessary adjustments to the bunkers when necessary. The bunkers are still a hazard and we will put the resources into the bunkers that make them as fair as possible.

Turf portion of the Range Tee is Open!

 

The dandelions and clover are really starting to push through and we will be out spraying weeds and fertilizing the golf course over the next couple of weeks. Some of the bluegrass rough around the bunkers have not began to grow and we will begin addressing some of the issues we these bunker banks next week. We have a new staff member that took over for Justin Ellison, who has moved on to Windsong Farms, and his name is Brandon Howard. Brandon started with us last week and is catching on with our golf course operations. He will be an integral part in our agronomic practices and will be responsible for most of Fertilizer and Chemical applications. We have him caught up with the layout of the golf course and will be throwing him into as many different situations over the next couple of weeks.

Brandon Howard will be fertilizing and spraying weeds for us over the next couple of weeks.

Sheldon has a couple of fairways aerified with the Vertidrain

OnThe Course April 17th

Brandon Howard mowing greens

We have some frost this morning but it should not delay play very much. We are going to be mowing greens with triplex mowers today and adding sand to some bunkers. Brandon will be working on a couple greens on the Executive course that have been covered for a couple of days. We want to get some growth going on these greens to help repair some damage from last fall. Brandon is going to verticut the greens, topdress and seed them. We will then keep the covers on for several weeks to help with germination and establishment of the new seedlings. Please play to the temperary pin location until further notice. We have also tilled the area between #1 and #2 on the Executive course that will be a new fairway. We should get this area seeded over the next week if the weather allows. We will be roping this area off and ask that everyone stay out of the seeded area.

We are having a Grounds Committee Meeting today and will be duscussing course conditions. The rest of this week we will be working on getting the course mowed and several small projects. We will be setting the walk mowers up for greens on Wednesday. We will also be looking at opening the turf portion of the range tee later this week. We will continue to keep the tee open as long as the weather contimues to stay warm and we are able to start to get recovery growth on the divots that will be made.

Fernando rolling the fairway nursery that was seeded last fall

On The Course April 14th

It is a cool morning but there is no frost and its supposed towarm into a nice day. We are out setting up the course. We will be changing pin locations. Javier will be moving the tees around and the greens are being mowed. We will also be cleaning sticks and debris up from the winds lastnight. Enjoy A beautiful start to the weekend.

On The Course April 13th

Finally a morning without a frost delay.  The guys are out early this morning to get the course ready for the day.  There is a good chance of some rain later on in the morning so we are going to try and get all of our mowing done before it rains.  We are rolling greens this morning and Jason is cutting cups.  We are also mowing collars and approaches and fairways to clean them up for the weekend.  Yesterday #3 and 4 greens on the short course were covered with HPI covers to help keep soil temps up and to stimulate turf growth.  For the time being there will be temporary pins cut in the fairways.

Sheldon tilled in the new fairway on #1 short course again yesterday.  We will be working on the fairway next week to get it ready for seed.  It is still a little cold for seed to germinate right now so we will wait on temps to warm up some more before seeding it.

Fernando, Ernesto, and Jose working on adding sand to #2 greenside bunker.  We will be working on several bunkers over the next few weeks to get them up to the appropriate amount of sand for play.

On The Course April 13th

Yesterday we had a subcontractor do some roof patching work at the barn.  They had to use a scissor lift to reach the roof to work on it.  As you can see in the background the barn is where we store our greens covers in the summer time.  It is important for the covers to have a dry place to be stored and the holes in the roof were letting in rain water.

It is again very frosty and very cold on the course this morning.  Temps again dipped into the 20's last night which will keep us behind schedule.  However once the course thaws and we are able to get out there we will be tri-plex mowing greens, doing tee service, and working on bunkers.

Carlos mowed our nursery fairway in two directions yesterday to clean it up and get it looking good.  We will be rolling it today and also putting down some fertilizer to kick start some more growth. 

On days when we are under weather delays we often have the crew work on projects around the shop or out at the barn area.  Today the guys are working on cleaning and detailing equipment.  It is a good chance to keep our equipment in good condition.

On The Course April 11th

Another cold evening last night with the low temp hitting 23 degrees.  We are covered in frost once again but hopefully it will burn off a little faster today with warmer temperatures forecasted.  We will be rolling greens today and cutting cups.  We will also continue adding sand to bunkers today that are in need.  The guys were able to add sand to the practice bunker and 12 fairway bunker yesterday.

We were able to get a good amount of the native area on #7 flail mowed yesterday.  We will continue to work on the natives over the next few weeks.  It is a long process but our new Wiedenmann Super 500 flail mover is doing a very nice job.

On The Course April 10th

It was down right cold on the golf course last night.  The weather station on our irrigation computer showed the temperature dipping to 22 degrees at about 3 a.m.  With temps like this it will take extra time this morning for the course to warm up.  There is a considerable amount of frost this morning and we will be closed until things thaw out.  Above is a picture of some cattails that have ice on them from irrigation last night, thats how cold it was.  When the course thaws today we will be getting back to mowing rough areas and doing some bunker work.  We will not be mowing any fine turf areas today, we will watch temps throughout the week to determine mowing for the week.  There is not a lot of growth in the fine turf areas with temps being so low.

Yesterday we continued our work on the native areas with our flail mower.  We are currently working on the native between number 2 and 7 fairways.  We will continue this work all week to try and get as much done as we can.

On The Course April 8th

Happy Easter!!  It is a very cool start to our day with temps in the low 30's.  The course is frozen this morning and will take a little while to warm up but temps should rise today and make for comfortable playing conditions.  We will be rolling greens this morning, raking bunkers and resetting the course.  We were able to get some rough areas mowed yesterday that needed it but there are still a lot of areas that are thin and filling in that we will be waiting to mow until next week.  It should be a nice day for golf so come out and play.

  #2 green was totally frozen this morning.  A sign of how cool the night temps are able to dip this time of the year.

On The Course April 7th

Fairways were mowed on Friday

 Friday was a busy day for us getting all of the primary turf mowed after an extensive frost delay. Just have to remember it is still the first week of April and we have some colder temperatures moving in for early next week. Despite the frost delay yesterday we were able to get the greens mowed and rolled. The Tees, Collars, Approaches, Fairways and Intermediate rough was mowed. Troy changed all of the cups and Jose Sanchez worked on Tee Service.

Jason and Troy were able to get our Direct Drive irrigation motor up and running and we were able to run a night cycle of water last night. We have been trying to keep the course as dry as possible and I had a few comments yesterday on how the fairways were rolling a little bit. We did have to water fairways and tees last night and we only had one stuck head this morning on #8 Tee. The system collects rust in the old steel pipes which usually causes irrigation heads to stick on for the first couple of irrigation cycles.

This morning we are rolling greens and mowing some rough areas. We will continue to be cart path only until late next week when we might allow carts off the path. If the turf begins to actively grow we will let carts off the path and if you remember from last year we had carts on the path almost until May 1st. The range tee has been gaining a lot of ground over the last two weeks and we might be opening the turf tee late next week if the weather continues to be above normal temperatures. The cover helps keep the soil temperature high enough to promote turf growth. There is no frost on the course this morning and we will be ready for a full day of golf. There are some spotty showers that could show up later this morning but there doesn't appear to be much on the radar.

Intermediate rough around the fairways has been mowed but we have not mowed the Walkpaths.

Bunkers have been edged and we will be adding sand to them next week.

On The Course April 5th

White Tee Marker that is also "Combo Tee".

 We have a "Combination Tee" rating for the golf course that fits between our Blue Yardage 6761 and our White Yardage of 6143.  The "Combination Tee" yardage will be 6456 and is rated by the MGA. If you are playing the "Combination Tees" you will play from the tee markers that have the blue/white diamond on the side of the marker as seen in the two picture on this page. Troy will finish painting the back nine markers later today. Please talk to the Pro shop or myself if you need any clarification on the "Combination Tees".

Blue Tee Marker that is also "Combo Tee".

On the course today we have pulled the range tee cover and mowed the tee. The tee is looking very good for April 5th and we will be opening the range tee late next week. Until then we will utilize the hitting mats. We are working on a couple more bunkers today and will be filling stump holes on the back nine. Jason is working on the clubhouse lawn irrigation and will be testing irrigation stations throughout the golf course. We had a small leak on #5 green that started late yesterday afternoon. Please let the Pro shop know if you see any standing water that doesn't look right. The leak on #5 is one that happens every couple of years. The steel pipe just past the isolation valve for the green is corroding and we have a pin hole leak that shows up every other year. Old steel pipe that has been in the ground since 1968 tends to have some pin hole leaks that show up. We will get it fixed and look into replacing the green loop in the near future.

Cristian is out on the rough mower this morning working on tee rough. Tomorrow we will be mowing and rolling greens, changing cups and mowing fairways. We have some rain moving in for the weekend but the trend has been for most of it to miss us to the east or west.

Wild Turkeys were out on the course yesterday.

On The Course April 4th

Justin, Troy and Jason enjoyed a quick nine yesterday afternoon.

 We have some frost on the course this morning. I don't think it will stick around very long but we will need to stay off of the turf for a little while this morning. We will be working on small projects this morning getting the shop transfered over to our summer set up and getting the barn area cleaned up. Jason is going to be working on the clubhouse and tennis irrigation this morning. Justin and I will be working on a couple more Native areas getting them flail mowed and cleaned up.

We will be running some irrigation on the course later this morning once the air temperature warms up. We need to test some stations as well as water some areas that are starting to dry out. The areas that are just starting to fill in will need a little extra attention over the next couple of weeks.

#18 fairway is looking better everyday with only a few spots that need some work.

On The Course April 3rd

We have received only a trace of rain overnight. The temperatures for the week look to be staying in the low 60's and night time temperatures in the upper 30's. Today we are mowing greens, collars, approaches, fairways and some rough. We sprayed greens yesterday with some ammonium sulfate and we will be checking the response we get. If we start to see some positive growth we will begin to utilize walk mowers and get the greens closer to our normal speed.

Mowing and Cleaning up some native areas.

The crew has finished edging bunkers and moving the sand around to help create a consistent depth. Over the next week we will continue to add some sand to the bunkers. We will also be continuing our native work and clean up. Jason has most of the irrigation system charged up and last night we left the system charged for the first time this season. At this time it does not appear that we have any more major irrigation leaks. Jason has fixed a couple valves and a irrigation head that was broke. Overall we the system seems to be in great shape going into the season. As we test stations over the next week more issues could show up and we will be dealing with them as soon as possible.