Final days of fall...

So far we have been all over the weather spectrum this fall.  From a mid september cold snap that saw our first freeze on the 15th of the month at 31 degrees, to a massive high pressure ridge in early October that brought record highs (89 degrees on Oct. 5th) along with three straight mornings of record high minimum temperatures (64, 61, and 68 on the 5th, 6th and 7th.)  Those temperatures for the first week of October were very typical of what we should experience in the middle of July!  Furthermore, the amount of precipitation has also taken a nose dive since an extremely wet spring and early summer.  Since August 20th we've had only 8 measurable rainfall events totalling only 2.15 inches in the last two months.  I'm not sure what average is for that period but I'm pretty sure we're below that number by a bit...

Regardless, fall is still one of the best times of the year in my opinion.  Cooler days and nights allow me to sleep a little easier, football (or hockey season for those fans) is in progress finally, and the leaves start their annual signaling of cooler temps and shorter day lengths as well.  For those of you curious, at this point in October we are currently losing around 3 minutes of day light every day and will lose 22 minutes of daylight over the course of this third week of October.  Winter is starting to creep a little closer to the back door every day.

The staff on the golf course has dwindled a little more recently as the grass begins to grow less and the days are shorter, but there is still plenty going on out there.  Lots of tree trimming has taken place, and will most likely have to be finished up next spring.  I really had no idea that Ash trees were such droopy growers.  Furthermore, we are tearing into a large project of rebuilding the tee box on 16, removing, rerouting, and replacing the old cartpath from 15 green to 16 tee, as well as reshaping the bunker left of 15 green to make it a little more in play and to enhance cart traffic flow around it.  This is another project that we will be finishing up next spring.  Also, take a look at all the rest of the new tees that were seeded a week or two ago, lots of little greens hairs are starting to poke up all over the place.  Let's keep our fingers crossed for all of those little guys to brave the long winter and pop up fast next spring.

I hope everyone has had a change to get out and enjoy the course the last few weeks as the leaves were in their peak display.  It sure is tough to beat this time of year having the course to yourself on a nice warm fall afternoon.  Enjoy it while you can!