Qualifying 35 Million Gallons of Water

Thursday, June 30, 2011

In a recent blog post I mentioned that we use 35 million gallons of water per year.  35 Million is an average of the last 3 years; during years with a lot of rain we use less, dry years more.  This seems like a lot but let me work on qualifying that number and how the water is used. We know that we use more water now based on the water usage reports that the club must report to the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) every year.  On average between 2004 and 2006 we pumped 10,908,578...

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1.45 Inches of Rain

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

The irony to this is that I am in the process of writing a blog post about irrigation.  The irrigation was shut off last night after the golf course received 1.45 inches of rain yesterday evening.  The storm produced a lot of wash in the bunkers, a lot of large limbs down, and two downed trees.  There is no permanent damage but it will take our full crew at least the entire day to clean up from this storm.  This is where progress is lost and we will be playing catch up in regards...

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Wildlife on the Golf Course

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

The golf course is host to a lot of wild animals and birds including deer, squirrels, beaver, fox, hawks, osprey, countless small bird species, blue heron, ducks, geese and even the occasional bald eagle.  It is wonderful to have a natural setting for animals to thrive within the city limits.  Please do not attempt to feed these wild animals as this drops their natural ability to survive and makes them more likely to approach humans.  It brightens my day to see all of these creatures...

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Course Update, Upcoming Maintenance Days and Green Speeds

Sunday, June 26, 2011

I am writing this on a beautiful Sunday afternoon in between syringing greens.  We try our hardest to stay out of the way but sometimes we have to inconvenience golf to syringe the greens.  Thank you for your patience as we work to keep the greens cool on the warm, dry summer days.  Course Update The course is progressing nicely as we barrel toward July.  The fairways are in overall good shape, the tee boxes, save a few with soil issues on #11 and 12 are handling the traffic...

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Tee Boxes on #11 and #12

Friday, June 24, 2011

On holes 11 and 12, the turf on the green, blue and black tee boxes is obviously weak.  Upon further examination, university research and soil sampling, we have found that the soils underneath the sand capped teeing grounds are acid sulfate soils.  These soils have turned the sand growing medium so acidic that the turf cannot perform well.  Testing has revealed that the 1:1 pH of these sands is anywhere from 3.95 to 4.15.  pH needs to be greater than 6.0 and less than 7.0 to...

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Driving Range Putting Green Closed

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

The Driving Range Putting Green will be closed until Tuesday, June 28 to have a chance to recover from excessive traffic.  This green is in great shape but a little time off will help direct traffic towards the on deck putting green and the clubhouse putting green.  We will be rotating through the greens by closing one a week until the weather improves.&nb...

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Answering Some Recent Questions

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

1.  Why is the golf course closed on Mondays? This is not the first or the last time I will hear this question and it is a very good one.  The reason we are closed on Mondays is to give our team the opportunity to perform valuable maintenance and management practices that would be difficult to complete during play.  For example, yesterday we vented, fertilized, applied a lime application to and topdressed greens.  We also fertilized and aerated green surrounds, fertilized tees and mowed out the range.  The range also received...

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VSGA Women's Stroke Play Championship

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

The second round of the VSGA Women's Stroke Play Championship is underway.  We are strictly mowing grass this week and are not involved in a lot of project work.  The event is giving us the opportunity to do a lot of work in grounds and around our maintenance facility.  I believe the golf course to be in great condition for the event.  I hope the membership comes out to enjoy the course and the wonderful weather after the tee sheet re-opens at 11:00 a.m.  The golf course is peaking right now due to warmer temperatures. ...

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Course Update

Sunday, June 12, 2011

The golf course received 1.35" of rain last night and is in rough shape.  Strong thunderstorms made a real mess of the golf course and washed most of the 57 bunkers.  Our staff will work hard this morning to put the course back together ahead of play but the reality is that some golf will have to be played while we are still working.  Golf Carts will be restricted to the path to prevent damage to the saturated turf.  Due to the heavy rain, the putting greens will be rolling a little bit slower as we...

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Great articles from the USGA regarding US Open.

Friday, June 10, 2011

USGA Green Section Rec...

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Walkway to #1 Green Renovated

Wednesday, June 08, 2011

We are trying a new approach on the walking trail behind the first green this year.  This area has worn out every year due to the heavy foot traffic it receives.  In the past, we have regrassed this area with different types of turf and changed our management practices but it has still failed.  This year we stripped the old, damaged turf, tilled in topsoil and organic fertilizer, and resodded the area with T-10 bermuda grass.  This turf is a very aggressive, traffic tolerant...

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#7 finished. Wrapping up a long week.

Friday, June 03, 2011

We are finishing all of the drainage and sod work today by laying the last half acre of sod.  Drainage is complete and sodded on #1, 7, 12 and 16 and will wrap up on 14 and 9 today.  We will have laid roughly an acre of sod this week and installed 800 feet of drainage.  The drainage work and regrading that has been done this week should be a permanent solution to the problem areas on 1, 7, 9, 12, 14, 16, and 18.  We will continue to install drainage this winter in problematic...

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Wrapping up #7 green surround.

Thursday, June 02, 2011

There will be some exposed soil today that will be sodded tomorrow.  We are using a more shade tolerant grass around this green.  Thank you for playing all of these sodded areas as ground under repair...

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