10 Tee Cleanup

The following are some pictures of clean up we have done along the left side of 10 tee box.  We started by dividing the two overgrown ornamental grasses that were right next to the tee.  We were able to divide these into 15 individual plants which we spaced out along the entire left side of the tee.  In the mean time, we cleared brush and vines along the left side that were becoming overgrown.  This will make a big difference on the appearance of this tee complex.

The two ornamental grasses that we divided into 15 plants.  They are black because we burned them down a few weeks ago.

This is how the tee looked before doing any clearing.  You can see the tree branches were starting to stick out over the edge of where we mow.

After clearing some of the brush back.  Also, you can see some of the ornamental grasses spaced out for planting.

After heavy limning of trees and clearing of brush.

All the newly divided ornamentals spaced out along the left side of the tee.

Goose Damage Repair

We just started taking plugs from our nursery green to repair damage from geese.  Number 12 green has about 55 plugs alone so it will take us a few days to finish

Spring Warm Up

What a relief the last few days have been from the frigid temperatures we have had most of the winter.  The golf course was opened up last Friday, and has been busy every since.  It has been great to get out on the course for some of our early spring duties.  We have sprayed all of our zoysia tees and fairways with pre-emergent and roundup to kill any poa annua that has popped up.  The roundup does not harm the zoysia since it is still dormant.  Yesterday we were able to mow greens for the first time since early last December.  I was amazed at how much grass we actually cut off since we have been so cold the last couple of months.  It really smoothed them out as well.  Today we got the roller out for the first time, and smoothed the greens out even more.  What a difference this machine makes, especially this time of year.  We will continue to clean up the course from the winter this week and will soon be mowing rough.

Winter Refurbishing

We have been spending the bulk of our time the last couple of months inside the shop doing our normal winter work.  That's right, I do me work.  Just because I have not made a post since November does not mean we were taking all of that time off.  The winter time is admittedly slower paced, but lots of projects are still being accomplished.   This includes lots of sanding, staining, spray painting, and reorganizing.  We have 24 benches that sit on every hole with some having two that we sand and re-stain.  We also have ball washers and trash cans on every hole that we sand and repaint.  Winter is also a good time to bring in all of our 150 yard poles and repaint them.  The few days that we have been able to get outside we spent cleaning up limbs from the heavy winds we have had.  Last year, the weather allowed us to get many trees limned up.  Fortunately, we finished about two-thirds of the course during the winter.  We have not been as lucky this year with brutally cold temperatures, and now a heavy snow cover.  I still have confidence that we will be able to get through a lot of the remaining trees.  

Here is one of the 24 benches that we refurbish.

All of the 150 yard poles repainted.  We also made six extras for replacement throughout the year.

A look from the clubhouse down #1 fairway after nearly a foot of snow.

Our assistant superintendent Nick Bishop has moved on from Swope Memorial to be the assistant at Crestwood Country Club in Pittsburg, KS.  He is now closer to family and has fishing and hunting right out of his backdoor.  I'm a little jealous of the second part since being in the city makes good fishing spots are hard to find.  Nick was a huge part of our team the last two years, and we wish him the best.

We have since hired Josh Linn as assistant superintendent.  Josh is originally from Smith Center, Kansas and is a recent graduate of the University of Arizona.  He brings a wide range of experiences from different golf courses including working at Dove Mountain where the PGA's Match Play Championship has been held the last few years.  We look forward to what Josh brings to the team.

Tree Trimming

Some much needed tree trimming was recently done around some of our tee boxes a couple of weeks ago.  The trimming we had done was on trees that were to high for us to reach from the ground with our pull saw.  We contracted this work out to K.C. Arborist who did a fine job in a timely manor.  The pictures below are the before and after of 16 tee.  This is a short par 3 that had an ash tree overhanging the left side of the tee box hampering the use of a good portion of it.  Two other areas of trees that were limbed up were on number 5 and 13.  These areas also had trees that were growing in the line of sight from the tee boxes.  We will continue this winter to limb up trees where we are able.

Two Bunker Renovations on #6

The crew has been at it again with a couple bunker renovations on #6.  A few posts ago, I showed some pictures of the renovation we did to the back left bunker.  This post is about the other two bunkers we completed. 

 The above picture shows some of what we were up against with the renovation.  The bunker floor on this end was lined with large rocks.  The left side of the photo shows some of the rocks we removed. 

We added a couple sections of drainage lines to help catch some of the water coming off the hill a little quicker.

This is the same area with all new tile and pea gravel added for drainage.

 

Here is the completed bunker renovation with all new sand.

The above photo shows the back right bunker after old sand and drainage had been removed and new drain tile and pea gravel added.

This is the completed bunker on the back right of #6.

Number 6 has had quite a face lift this year.  We added a zoysia approach during the summer and have renovated all three bunkers in the last month.  With all that work, it still doesn't make the green any easier to hit.

For the year, we have now renovated a total of 8 bunkers.  I believe this is the most we have been able to do in a single year over the last six years.  My hope is to continue renovating at least a couple over the winter months.  It will be tough to do when we are down to just myself and my assistant for a crew. 

Fall Seeding

We have finished all of our fall seeding for the year in only a couple of days.  This year, we only had to use about 500 pounds of seed compared to 2,000 pounds the last few years.  The timely rains and overall cooler temperatures this year really helped most of the rough make it through the season. 


The slits from the tractor mounted slit seeder.



This is the small portion of our fescue nursery that we had to reseed.

Small area around a bunker that was aerified and then seeded heavily.