It is an excellent day for golf. The course is in great shape, and the weather is beautiful. If you get a chance, come out and play a round.
The greens were verticut and top dressed earlier in the week, and are rolling great. The tees were fertilized. Jerry has been working on drying up the wet area on the driving range. There are a few more clippings this week, so the Buffalo Blower will be out to tidy up today and tomorrow. Steven is pulling the last of the ropes today. However, we will continue to use green stakes to control traffic as needed throughout the growing season. Other than that, our time has been spent on routine golf course maintenance tasks such as mowing, setting up for play (changing hole locations and moving tee markers), and raking bunkers.
The weather continues to be hit and miss, but there have been more good days than bad over the last week. So far, the forecast for the weekend looks good. The precipitation history page has been updated with the monthly total from May.
With the grind of fairway aeration behind us, it was nice to be able to focus on mowing and daily preparations this week. You may have noticed the poll question on the right side of the blog page. If you have not seen it yet, check it out and cast your vote.
Not top ten nominee
Last Saturday someone took a hack out of the 12th green right next to the cup. The picture above shows what it looked like on Sunday morning before the hole location was changed. Hopefully, this was done by the last player of the day, so no one else had to putt through the divot.
Aeration cores spread next to the path on hole 12
You may have noticed that some of the fairway aeration cores have been spread out in various areas throughout the golf course. They were spread and leveled in areas where we wanted to improve turf conditions. As they grow in, they will begin to look more like grass, and less like piles of dirt.
Aeration cores
Speaking of aeration cores, we still have some for sale for those who are interested. For more information call the maintenance shop at (541) 997-4530. Aeration cores can easily be used to create a nice lawn for a cheap price.
Sandpines has received over two inches of rain since Monday. Despite the wet weather fairway aeration was completed on Thursday. The recent aeration of all the short grass areas (greens, tees, approaches, & fairways) has kept the course in very playable condition even though the rain has been heavy at times. The greens were top dressed early in the week. Needless to say, the rain has washed the sand in nicely. The golf course is in good shape and its a great time to get out and play some golf over the holiday weekend.
New fawn
The wildlife at Sandpines has been busy this spring. I took the picture above early in the week. The fawn was estimated to be about 1-2 days old at the time. There are a couple of sets of baby ducks around as well. One set has been hanging around the pond located between holes 16, 17, and 18. The other set can be seen around the pond on holes 4 and 5. The killdeer chicks are hard to tell from the adults at this point. They can be heard frequently around the course. These are just a few of the examples I have noticed this week while working around the course. If you keep an eye out while you are playing, you will surely see many more examples of wildlife spread throughout the golf course.
The fairway aeration is coming along nicely. Holes 2, 3, 4, 7, and 14 were completed this week (holes 6 and 13 are also nearly finished). If the weather and equipment continue to cooperate, fairway aeration could be completed as early as next week
Fairway aeration on hole 3
The greens were verticut and top dressed early in the week. The greens are mostly healed from aeration and continue to improve daily. New cups, flagsticks, and flags were put out last Sunday. The new accessories are a real improvement. The sunshine and good conditions have me itching to get out and play some golf. Hopefully, I will get out there soon.
The greens are healing up nicely from last weeks aeration. They are still a bit bumpy, but are improving daily. We lowered the height of cut this week. It will likely take another two to three weeks until we reach our peak season mowing height.
Jerry aerating hole 9 fairway
Tee aeration was completed earlier this week. We began aerating fairways on Thursday. Holes 1 and 9 were completed. The grass growth has really picked up. Between aeration and mowing, there has not been time for much else.
Large pile of aeration cores
I have received a few phone calls about the availability of aeration cores. We now have some stock piled. They are $10 per tractor scoop. Most pickups will take between 2-4 tractor scoops depending on the size of the truck. For more information call the maintenance shop (541) 997-4530.
Turn the aeration cores above into a nice lawn like this
It has been a busy week for the maintenance staff at Sandpines. Aeration of greens was the main focus. The weather cooperated nicely, and despite a few equipment problems, we were also able to complete the aeration of approaches.
The precipitation total for April has been updated, and can be accessed by clicking on the precipitation history tab.
I put together a video below showing our greens aeration process. I have not made many videos, but hopefully it will give you the general idea of what goes on at Sandpines during greens aeration. There is a short clip in the video showing the TB 200 brush, which we were able demo during the greens aeration process. For more information on the TB 200 contact Mike Powers at A&L Supply.
I would like to thank the maintenance staff at Sandpines for their dedication, hard work, and long hours this week during greens aeration.
In an effort to be as efficient as possible, we have been mowing the large tees on the golf course with a fairway mower. We started doing this last year when one of our triplex mowers died. We are actually able to mow about 65 percent of our tees with a fairway mower. About 20 percent continue to be mowed with a triplex, while about 15 percent require a walk behind mower. In addition to saving time, this also helps keep hours off our triplex mowers, which are both 1995 models and have 10,125 and 8,363 hours respectively.
Spring 2011 Killdeer chick
There are some new Killdeer chicks located located near the chipping green. They seem to spend most of their time around the cart path between the chipping green and hole 14 fairway. If you are traveling in that area keep an eye out, you may seen them, but be careful, they are not too savvy around vehicles. An adult Killdeer will likely try to get your attention by acting like it is hurt to draw your attention away from the chicks.
Fall 2010 greens aeration
We will begin greens aeration following play on Sunday (May 1st) at 12 noon. We will also be closed Monday (May 2nd), and Tuesday (May 3rd) to complete the process. With the cooperation of the weather and equipment, we should also be able to complete the aeration of approaches in that time period.
We need to aerate the greens regularly in order to keep them healthy and provide the best playing surface possible. We will be using 5/8" hollow core tines in order to remove thatch while alleviating compaction. The thatch will be replaced with sand. This will create a sand channel for gas exchange and water infiltration. I came across a video by Pace Turf, that does a nice job explaining the benefits of aeration. For those of you that were following my blog last October, its same video I put on the blog for the fall greens aeration. If you have not seen it, I highly recommend checking it out.
