On The Course November 14th, 2014

Cross Country Skier across 13 Green? Not Good!

 We have started the initial phase of the winter ski trail. We had a good amount of snow this week and had some Cross Country Skiers using the golf course already. Unfortunately they decided to cut across the golf course and ski across several greens. We want people to come out and enjoy skiing on the golf course but avoid skiing on the fairways, tees and especially the greens. The compacted snow creates patches of ice and ice can kill turf. We have created a ski trail throughout the golf course and as we get more snow we will be grooming the trail. We do not have enough snow yet to groom but have packed the trail and have the route marked with old flags and flagsticks. We are in the process of creating a map of the route and will have more details as the trail receives more snow.

Ski trail is marked with flags and has been packed.

On The Course November 7th, 2014

Hauling extra mats on the trailer to piece in on the edges of greens.

 The 2014 golf season is coming to a close. The crew has been working hard this week getting the golf course ready for winter. The Championship Course is closed for the season but the Flagsticks will remain on the Executive Nine just in case we get a break in the weather. We are looking at a pretty good decrease in temperatures over the weekend.

The irrigation system is blown out and all of the Champioship greens are covered and staple down. The crew is working on some smaller details and getting the ski trail marked. We have had a pretty good golf season and are looking forward to getting in the office and start planning for 2015. We will have some new wrinkles to the winter activities with the addition of a trail groomer and tracked RTV to help maintain a quality ski trail. When we get some snow and start packing the trail I will be posting more regular updates as to how the trail looks. We will also be working on a color map for the trail system and will have that posted once it is finished.

I would like to Thank JD and Zach from the Proshop for helping roll the covers out on the greens. Ken was able to get Mark and Dave from the Clubhouse staff to help as well. With the additional help the crew was able to get everything done this week that was needed as we look at the cold temperatures for next week.

Fernando Patino laying sod in the bunker from our drainage cutouts.

We had the mechanic, assistant superintendents and even the 19th Hole Bartender Mark covering greens this week.

On The Course September 5th, 2014

Aerification went a little better yesterday with a break in the rain later in the day and the sun shining for  a little bit. We were able to get the back nine greens brushed in and rolled just in time as the first golfers were making the turn. Overall I think the greens came out great from aerification and we should be able to get them back in shape very quickly. We are mowing greens this morning and will roll them later today if they remain dry. Corey and Kurt will be setting pin locations today.

We were able to finish some of the fairways over the past couple of days and will be able to get the rest done early next week. There is a little sand on the surface that we will be brushing in as they dry out. So far we have finished 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6 completely with the Super 500 verticutting and the CR10 Topdressing. Fairways 5, 7 and 11 have been verticut with the Super 500 but still need to be topdressed. We will be working on the rest of the fairways early next week.

Aerification Update Day 2

I think I know where the golf is to be found.

We had a very good first day for aerification and a very wet second day. We were able to finish topdressing the back nine greens Wednesday morning but were halted by some nuisance rain for the rest of the day. We had a couple breaks in the weather to be able to get some fairways verticut and topdressed. The sand started to dry a little but remained wet most of the day. The crew worked from dark in the morning until after dark yesterday evening.

 

The front nine greens are ready for play today and we will be working the topdressing sand in on the back nine after they dry this morning. Tees are being reset today and the course will open at 12pm. We will be verticutting 5 and 11 fairways and Corey will be finishing topdressing 3 and 6 fairways.  

Javier Sanchez blowing debris off of the fairways

Kurt Wacker using the Super 500 to verticut fairways

Verticut slit on 18 Fairway

We are getting about 3/8" Depth on the verticut knives pulling thatch out

Aerification Update

1/4" Aerification Holes on Greens

 Our aerification process is going very well so far despite the heavy rain we have received this past weekend. We have the greens mostly done with some topdressing left this morning. Tees are cored and cleaned up and will be topdressed later today depending on the incoming storm. Fairways have been delayed a little with the wet conditions but we are working on them this morning. Yesterday was a perfect day for the process and we completed a lot of work. The golf course will be open on Thursday at 12pm.

More detailed updates to follow!

Corey Heasley and Kurt Wacker aerifying #10 Green

Equipment Manager Shaun Hill Deep Tining Nursery Green #12

We verticut greens prior to the aerification process to help firm up the putting surface

Crew cleaning up #7 Green

Crew blowing aerification plugs on #3 green

This morning it looks great to the east. To the west we have storms rolling towards the course.

Beautiful sunrise this morning!

2014 Member/Member Tournament Pictures

On The Course June 16th

Toni Duerr mowing the approach on #6 at 4am Saturday morning.

 We had a great finish to the weekend with the Invitational on Saturday. Congratulations to Mr. Talberg and Mr. Ogdahl for outlasting the rest of the competitors. It was a great shootout and a great tournament. The Grounds crew really stepped up and put a great effort in preparing for the tournament. It is a challenge to get everything mowed and cleaned up before an 8:00 am shotgun start. The staff mowing fairways were on the course before 3:30am Friday and Saturday morning. The rest of the staff was on the course by 3:45am and we were able to accomplish a lot before the event. We had a little help from a couple of people that volunteered to work the tournament. Larry Gorman who is our Toro representative from MTI mowed greens on Thursday morning and approaches on Friday Morning. Former Assistant Superintendent at Medina Golf and Country Club and now Head Superintendent at Theodore Wirth Golf Course, Troy Tschida, helped with course set up on Friday. It is great to have individuals take time out of their busy schedule to help get the course ready for the Invitational Tournament.

Corey Heasley and Troy Tschida changing the hole location on Invitational Friday

 We have received almost 2 inches of rain in the past 24 hours which has saturated the course. We will be cart path only for the outside event and member play will start at 3pm. We are mowing greens today and will be trying to get the rest of the course mowed before more predicted rain this evening. The forecast is calling for spotty showers on and off all week. Hopefully most of it will miss the golf course. 

Al White drains an 8 foot putt to go to an extra hole in the Invitational Shootout

Jason White and Al White finished in Second Place during the Invitaitonal

Invitational Champions Mark Talberg and Steve Ogdahl

On The Course June 12th

Larry Gorman from MTI giving us a hand with mowing greens this morning

 We are mowing and rolling greens this morning. We received 0.35" of rain last night and that has softened the course up a little. We will allow carts off of the path today but we recommend using caution as there are a couple of puddles in the rough areas. There is Ladies League this morning followed by a 1:30pm Shotgun for the Invitational Practice Round. The crew will be coming back this evening to mow the course and get ready for the opening round of the Invitational.

The willow stumps have been ground out of the area by #9 pond and the crew will be working on finish grading and seeding later today. We have scheduled the stumps to be ground out the past couple of weeks only to have it rain each time. Kent will be back out on Monday to finish grinding the rest of the stumps on the golf course.

We have had a lot of our normal routine agronomic practices be altered by the rain this season. When the weather is nice the crew has been working hard to get as much done as possible. We have been unable to consistently mow and roll greens on our normal schedule. If you have any questions regarding course conditions please email me directly.

Kurt Wacker mowing #7 green this morning

Bill, Ron and Tony mowing #9 fairway

On The Course June 6th

It will be a perfect day for golf today with clear skies and warm temperatures. Greens were sprayed yesterday with fertilizer and a wetting agent. The wetting agent helps pull moisture off of the putting surface and into the soil profile. The product we use needs to be watered in and we ran a night cycle last night to move the wetting agent into the soil profile. It was the first night irrigation cycle we have ran on greens all years. The good news is the greens feel firm and will be great for the weekend. The bad news is we had one irrigation head stick on #1 green. It ran for a couple of hours last night and left some standing water on the green. It is however draining very well with the wetting agent that was applied. We will be mowing it later this morning after the green has dried out.

Greens on the Executive course were aerified and topdressed yesterday. We will be running some irrigation on those later this morning. We are mowing and rolling greens this morning with the exception of #1. Fairways and rough are also being mowed. The crew will be working on some detail trimming to day to get ready for the weekend.

On The Course June 5th

Vertical Mowing/ Scarifying the Tee Surfaces

 We were finally able to take advantage of some good weather and get some agronomic work done. With all of the rain we have been getting a lot of the things we need to do to get good healthy turf has been delayed. Our priority over the past couple of weeks has been to try to keep up with the mowing and the detail trimming on a daily basis. Yesterday, we were able to vertical mow the tees and topdress them with a little sand. This will help true up and firm up the tee surfaces. We are removing thatch by doing this and adding sand back in its place. The healing time should be pretty quick with the Invitational already coming up next week.

Today we are rolling greens and spraying them with fertilizer and plant protectants. We were unable to spray on Monday with the rain over the weekend. The crew is working on mowing bunker banks and Sheldon is trying to keep up with the growth of the rough. We will be letting carts off the path today on most holes but might keep a few cart path only due to some wet conditions. Please use the cart path as much as possible to minimize the wear and damage in the wet areas of the golf course. Corey was able to get the front 9 bunker banks sprayed yesterday with some fertilizer and wetting agent. We still have a few thin areas on a few bunker banks and we want to get them to fill in.




Blowing Debris from the Tees

Corey Heasley adding a light coating of sand to fill in the grooves

Kurt Wacker dragging the sand into the turf canopy.

On The Course June 2nd

You can see the high water mark where the debris is sitting.

 It was quite the rain event Saturday afternoon into Sunday. On our weather station we had 0.91 inches of rain in one hour Saturday afternoon. In another event we received 0.76 inches in one hour. Our total for this rain event was 3.76 inches at the Weather Station on #3 and 3.87 inches at the rain gauge at the Maintenance Facility. The course has been draining well the past 24 hours and we expect to be out on the course this morning fixing bunkers and running some drainage pumps. The crew is going to work on sanding and seeding the Driving Range tee. If the greens are firm enough to mow later this morning we will try to get this done before the Shotgun Tournament this afternoon.

Water sitting on #14 Fairway Sunday Morning

 The mosquitos are out in full force and we would like to remind everyone that Bug Spray damages turf. Please use the cart paths or hard surfaces when applying bug spray. We are looking into fogging the tree lined areas on the back nine later this week to help mitigate some of the mosquitos. With all of the warm weather and large amounts of rain I would expect to see an above average mosquito hatch this year.

Water sitting between 5 and 6 fairways

Water sitting between 6 and 7 fairways

On The Course May 30th

Rubiel and Jose trimming the pond edge on #10

 We have finally hit a pretty good stretch of weather and the crew has been able to get caught up on most of the mowing. Sheldon and Craig were able to get most of the rough on the course cleaned up yesterday. We will be working on getting the rest finished today. We are in the spring/summer time period where the turf has a good flush of growth. The temperatures in the 80's along with all the rain we have been getting sure helps. The crew was able to get all of the trees trimmed the past couple of days as we start to work on some of the detail job tasks.

The willow stumps on 9 have been dug out and will be removed late next week. We brought in a mini excavator to help pull some of the larger surface roots out. We are dry enough on the course to bring in the stump grinder and get the rest of the stumps clean up next week. Some of these will be seeded and a few will be cleaned up with sod. Next week we will be topdressing fairways and approaches. This process will be taking us most of the week and if the weather cooperates should be minimally invasive. The topdressing will help firm up the fairways and help the surface drain a little better.

League play is full speed ahead.

Javier Sanchez pulling ball mark plugs out and filling with sand and seed

On The Course May 20th

Fernando Patino Needle Tining #9 Green

 On Monday we were able to get the front nine greens topdressed and needle tined. After the greens were needle tined they were brushed and rolled to smooth the putting surface. We still need to roll 3, 4 and 6 green on the front side. We were rained out of the rest of the putting surfaces. We are hopeful to finish this task as well as a growing list of others later this week.

We have received a total of 2.00 inches of rain in the past 24 hours. The course was finally drying out before the rain and should take it in fairly well. The crew is out this morning fixing bunkers, changing pin locations and pumping water out of low areas. Kurt Wacker and Rubiel Dorantes were able to get the irrigation leak on #12 fixed before the big rains moved in. We are close to be fully charged up and ready for the summer. We have to replace some internal drives on the irrigation heads and run through the clubhouse irrigation.

A very light coating of topdressing sand was applied to the greens

 We are having a Grounds Committee meeting this afternoon at 2pm. We will be discussing course conditions and upcoming projects. The Grounds Committee has formed a sub committee to look at the Maintenance Facility Renovation and Comfort Stations that will be added to the golf course.

MORE RAIN!!