Week of August 8th

Well, it has been a busy couple of weeks since the last time I updated the blog.  We had all the weather you can have the last couple weeks.  Close to record high temps, dry, windy, stormy and cool.  The team accomplished plenty fighting through all the curve balls mother nature threw at us.  

During the heat the team was faced with watering day in and day out.  Water management is tough when temperatures climb into the upper 90's.  Too much water can cause as many problems as too little.  

Carroll Tree Service was finally able to come back out to finish the last of the tree work along the fence on hole 6.  This huge Tulip Poplar was completely rotted and very dangerous because it was overhanging both the 6th green and Rolling Road.  

The team did have some irrigation repairs to complete the past few weeks, one of which was underneath the cart path close to the tee box on hole 5.  It has been a quite year with irrigation repairs but it always seems to happen when the temperatures ramp up.  

Some of the projects earlier this year depleted most of the grass we had at the nursery.  The team was able to spend a couple days tilling, removing unwanted grass, leveling and seeding the nursery for the next crop of bentgrass.  

During the course closure this week we were able to spray the weeds in our older native areas and spray the first round of herbicides in the new native areas that we are establishing this fall.  Please be on the look out for updates from the golf shop with restrictions in these new areas.  

Lastly, I wanted to share some pictures for this weeks aeration.  It was a tough week to complete everything.  We received an inch of rain Sunday night and another inch of rain Monday evening that also brought high winds. The team had to switch gears several times from punching, mowing, spraying and storm clean up.  

After the rain Sunday night the greens on the course were to wet to punch, so we switched to punching and topdressing all tees, approaches and the practice putting green. 

On Tuesday morning we needed to clean up the course from Monday night's storms.  The team was able to complete 6 greens Tuesday afternoon. 

The team was able to finish up the remaining 12 greens on Wednesday. They stayed late to make sure we could open the course up Thursday morning with just a little clean up and soil amendments to apply.

I am very proud of what the team was able to complete given all the weather challenges this week.  

Thanks for reading.