Winter Update

It’s hard to believe that the golf season has been over for one month now and we are well into what seems like it could be a cold and snowy winter. We were extremely fortunate to have a seven and a half month long golf season for this part of the country, and I couldn't believe how great the weather was this fall. With that being said, the grounds crew was able to clean up about 98% of the leaves on the course, do a little tree trimming, and start on the driving range tee box renovation.

The fall is definitely my favorite season of the year

This was our second to last Men's Day at about 60 degrees, hardly any clouds in the sky, and no wind

We decided to build a retaining wall between the top driving range tee box and new asphalt parking lot. Along with the new yellow stripes, this retaining wall will provide even more organization for parking golf carts up at the range. We received a generous donation of about 80 yards of topsoil to build up the top range tee so that it will now be more level for hitting from. We also plan to pull in another irrigation line and add a few irrigation heads for better watering coverage. We will complete this part and the grass grow in as soon as we can in the spring.

The retaining wall has been completed and the following picture shows the soil that was spread to level the range tee 

Shop season has begun and we are in full swing of getting all of the equipment ready for next golf season. Every single piece of equipment that we own will come in the shop for an oil and hydraulic fluid change, replacement of broken parts and greasing. We will also sharpen and grind all of the mower blades and reels. Our aged fairway and rough mowers will be getting some serious time in the shop this winter.  We are going to rebuild all ten of our fairway mower reels as they are no longer able to be sharpened from 10 years of use. Both rough mowers see about 30 hours of use per week during the golf season and need some replacement parts in the decks. Beyond that, all of our course accessories will get a fresh coat of paint and polyurethane for next golf season. 

As many of you probably aren’t thrilled about the 20” of snow so far that we have received, I am very relieved by it. It has provided our turf with much insulation to hopefully survive all winter and come into spring healthy. We have already had about a week and a half of zero and below temperatures, and the snow we have received is doing its job by keeping our turf at a safe temperature.

We'd probably rather see a green golf course, but I am happy to see a good covering of snow to protect our turfgrass this winter