On The Course July 24th, 2015

Corey Heasley topdressing greens on Tuesday morning

 We have started this Friday off with a little bit of rain this morning. We have received 0.35 inches of rain so far and the storms are clearing. We have a possible chance of some more light rain this afternoon. It should be a hot and humid day once the sun comes up. The crew has been delayed this morning but are heading out to mow green, rake bunkers and prepare the course for play today. We will be a little delayed this morning but should be back on time quickly.

We were able to get our topdressing done on Tuesday this week and it has been really beneficial for us this summer. We started on summer deep tine on fairway to help with surface drainage and we have complete a few fairways this week and will finish the rest up early next week. Should be a great weekend for golf even with the heat and humidity.

Nick Walters on the Weidenmann Deep Tine Machine

Matt Haughey rolling a long putt towards the hole

Member/Member Champions Matt Haughey and Tim Herbert

Moises Lopez aligning tee markers.

Jeff Smith (on left) made his first perfect shot with an ACE on #17 during the Member/Member

On The Course July 18th, 2015

Blowing Branches off Greens!

 We received 1.5 inches of rain this morning which included some very strong winds. We have some damage to the exterior of the clubhouse and Pool area but we do not have any large trees down. There are a lot of smaller branches and debris throughout the golf course. The crew is working on clearing off greens and bunkers. We have a few pulling larger branches to the cart path edges and will be picked up later this morning. Kurt and Fernando are running trash pumps around the course getting some of the low areas pumped out.

We are planning on getting most of the debris cleared from the fine turf areas and then we will be mowing greens and getting the course set for the Member/Member Tournament this afternoon. The weather is clearing off and now the golf course needs some time to drain and dry out. The crew very busy this morning and we should be able to get things back in shape pretty quickly.

We have a lot of debris to clean up this morning.

On The Course July 17th, 2015

Trash Pump earlier this week moving water out of a low area on #14

 Member/Member Tournament this weekend. We are mowing and rolling greens this morning. Fairways, tees and large rough areas will be mowed today. The course has dried out well from the rain earlier this week and we only saw a trace of rain last night. The crew will be working on bunkers later this morning after the fine turf areas are mowed.

We had 1.7 inches of rain earlier this week and Corey and Kurt did a great job of getting a lot of the low areas of the course pumped out and ready for play. The large transfer pumps have been working pretty good down on 2 Green. They have been running the past couple of nights to try to get the pond level as low as possible before the next rain event. We are getting closer to finish grade on the Executive Course Project and should be seeding the areas next week. We will be installing some irrigation and then fine tune the finish grade.

There has been perfect conditions for Turfgrass Diseases this week and we have seen some activity in some of our test plots on the executive course. On Tuesday morning I took a couple pictures of Dollar Spot mycelium growing in some tire tracks and a footprint depression. It may not sound too exciting to most but it was a pretty cool TURF GEEK moment. Why nature behaves the way it does is pretty cool.

We are looking at some pretty extreme heat conditions this weekend with a possibility of storm activity. The course is playing pretty good right now and we should have some great golf this weekend. All shots count on the back nine of the Member/Member. Always a fun finish to the tournament.

Cottony mycelium from the fungus Sclerotinia homoeocarpa, Dollar Spot

Turf Geek picture of the week! Dollar Spot mycelium in a foot print on the Executive Course

Kurt Wacker handwatering collar on Practice Green #1