Week of July 17th
Another busy week at the club. From normal weekly maintenance to prepping for MAGA tournaments, the crew had an amazing week.
For the last half of July I am pleased with how the course is looking but summer is not even close to being over. For superintendents the weeks between July 20th and August 15th are always the toughest weeks of the year. Long days, hot, humid, thunderstorms to deal with, water management and tired grass, makes these next couple of week the most important of the year - and will set the course up for late summer/early fall. We will be in full protection mode for what is coming up.
The team started off the week preparing for the 2-day MAGA Senior Championship. This tournament was held on Monday and Tuesday. We hosted close to 100 players each day. With tee times from 8:00am to 1:00pm both days, morning moisture prep was extremely important.
After the 2-day tournament, the team needed to play catch up. On Wednesday they knocked out most of our weekly details, mowed 90% of the rough and cleaned some weeds out of the native areas.
We were able to complete another round of spiking on greens this week. We are liking the results of this process. Spiking allows easier water infiltration into the soil and helps with gas exchange with very minimal disturbance to the putting surface. We will continue to use this process weekly as weather permits before our summer aerification that is scheduled for August 7th.
The team knocked out the drainage issue we are having on hole 9's cart path. This area has been staying wet for days after rain events. We cleaned out the wet soil and contaminated gravel. We then installed a sandier mix and added clean gravel. Please note that this area is marked ground under repair - please keep carts off this area as it dries.
Lastly, I wanted to take some time to talk about proper practice habits on our short game and warm up areas. The picture above shows the incorrect way to practice off the grass area in front of the matts. This area is about 4 square feet and 20 warm up shots. This divot pattern will take weeks to recover and fill in, limiting the use of this area for others to use.
This picture above shows the correct way to use the grass area. This is the same 20 warm up shots but these areas will recover in a week instead of a couple weeks or longer. Please use this linear divot pattern while practicing and warming up. Here is a link with more information on how to keep our practice areas nice for all to enjoy. https://youtu.be/DO99COs35tE
The team started off the week preparing for the 2-day MAGA Senior Championship. This tournament was held on Monday and Tuesday. We hosted close to 100 players each day. With tee times from 8:00am to 1:00pm both days, morning moisture prep was extremely important.
After the 2-day tournament, the team needed to play catch up. On Wednesday they knocked out most of our weekly details, mowed 90% of the rough and cleaned some weeds out of the native areas.
Thanks for reading.