Bunker Work Continues

The finishing touches are being put on #12 today and they have started renovating the greenside bunkers on #13. By shifting the front bunker to the left a little, it allows the right side bunker to be brought around the front right corner and a little closer to the green. Whenever you start digging around on a golf course you never know what kind of surprises might pop up. Thankfully, as of yet, there have been no unexpected's to speak of. We hope to have everything, #12 & #13, sodded by the end of the day Thursday. Everything should be back in play in a few weeks.

Bunker Work Commences

The bunker work has begun. The old sand was removed from the fairway bunkers on #12 and they were re-edged. New sand was put in today and they are back in play, be forwarned though that the new sand is very soft and the ball has a tendancy to plug. The left greenside bunker was ripped apart and renovated today also, it is almost completed. By the end of the week the whole hole should be nearly finished, just waiting on sod would be my guess. If there is no rain in the forecast and it is feasible, I will bring in the sod for both #13 and #12 in one shipment to save on costs...

Since the approach is getting a little work, we have stolen some sod from there and are using it to repair some of the dead spots we have on a few approaches. There was also some extra soil generated from the greenside bunkers and that is being put where the new tee box on #11 is going. That was a project that got postponed last year because there was no extra soil to work with from the bunker project, so this year we will be completing that. It will put the yardage for that hole from 190'ish to 215 or so, making it a good challenge for the championship tees. It will not be completed until this fall, so for now it will be rough graded and seeded with ryegrass.

And I want to thank everyone involved for a tremendous 50th Anniversary Party at the club last Sunday. I am so glad I got to play and be part of the celebration...

Day 44 - Rain, EAB, & Bunkers

And again I am extremely grateful for a super irrigation system! With very little rain this spring we have been pumping a lot of water onto the golf course. And though we have had the usual hiccups, the irrigation system has been working wonderfully. However, with all the wind we have had it has been a struggle to keep some of the seeded areas nice and damp. But things are progressing nicely. On that note, while most poor fairway areas are showing signs of good re-growth, there are some approach and collar areas that we plan to cut and sod next week. For the most part I have been pleased with the recovery of most of the golf course, excluding a few areas here and there.

Emerald Ash Borer (EAB) has been in the local news on a daily basis now that it has been found in St. Paul. How does that effect us is on a lot of members minds I gather, considering all the questions I have had in the past couple of weeks about it. There is no question it is devastating to any ash tree population, literally killing every tree, and we have a high population of ash trees. In fact the majority of trees on the golf course are ash trees, so when it gets here it will open the golf course up considerably. Our plan of attack right now is to inventory the golf course trees and start determining any "key" ash trees that we should consider chemical treatments for. This will start amongst the greens committee and go out to the board and membership from there. Preventative treatments have come down in cost, so it is reasonable to consider some for treatment but not a high number of trees. The best thing we can do is follow that course of action and start treating key trees to help prevent their demise. And along with that, let nature follow its course and deal with the tree removal when it comes to that. We could have it now, though I have seen no signs of it yet, or it could be many years before it makes it our way. The big thing is to not panic and start making any rash decisions about dealing with the high number of ash trees we have on the golf course. I will definitely keep everyone posted as to what we are doing in regards to the whole issue.

Bunkers, bunkers, bunkers. The project is starting early this year, next Tuesday as a matter of fact. Holes 12 & 13 are being renovated this summer, with some more work being put off until the fall. As usual there will be some minor tweaking to all the bunkers, the fairway bunkers on #12 will just have the old sand taken out and new sand put in. There will not be any moving, adding, or removal in that area. The greenside however will get some dramatic change with updated bunkers and a slight pinching of the approach. The work on #13 will really bring that hole into light. The fairway bunkers are being moved slightly more into the fairway and the second one will be brought in a little closer to the first. The willow tree along the pond will be removed and the fairway cut will be extended to within six feet or so of the pond edge. The greenside bunkers will be shifted slightly, with the right side bunker being brought in to the green closer and more towards the front right corner. The fall work which is tentatively planned right now would be a complete regrading and seeding of the 13th fairway. This would eliminate the drainage issues we have in the fairway, allow us to kill the predominantly poa annua fairway and seed in supreme blues, and make a much more playable surface. The winter kill that fairway suffered is a perfect example of how poorly the water moves through that area.

I apologize for the lapse in updates, I will do a much better job going forward. With EAB, minor projects, and everything else there is plenty too talk about.

Day 1

Well the season has officially begun for IVGC. And the picture here of hole 6 is what you can expect from a lot of the course. There are quite a few brown spots in the fairways, all of which can be attributed to the ice cover and water pooling from the winter. A lot of the collar and green edges show signs of desiccated turf, and number 16 has a couple of large turf areas where water collected and froze, damaging the turf. The covered greens (1, 7, 8, 15, 16, & putting green) are very green and the turf looks good, other then the spots mentioned on 16. All the other greens look typical for this time of year, some spots worse then others.

The biggest thing now is the need for warm weather. It will probably be a few weeks before we truly know how some of the brown areas will recover. Odds are many of them will come back in some fashion, probably thin and sparse. At that time we will be doing everything we need to do to get things back in shape. Aerifying, seeding, topdressing, fertilizing, etc... So here's hoping for some warmer weather very soon.

Quick Update

Well I think 99% of the snow and ice are gone (for now anyway). The warm weekend and the first couple of days this week have taken care of any ice cover we had on our greens. Dave and I have been out that last two days moving the softened ice and pooling water off the green surfaces. Even with 4 solid days in the 50+ range of temps we still had to chip through about 3 inches of ice on the front of number 18 yesterday. The whole exercise has given us a great understanding of the drainage issues some of our green complexes have. Thankfully we only have a couple of greens with spots where the water will pool if it can not drain through the soil profile. And we have also taken care of some drainage problems with the continuing bunker project.

Nice weather and little snow always creates excitement for the season to start and the course to open. During weather stretches like the one we are having now I always get asked by a few when the course will be opened. Well, if we can get a good couple weeks of this weather and dry things out good, it could be sooner then later. I think most agree there is still more snow to come, even if short lived, and that just means it will take longer to dry out. We are all hoping for an early spring this year and definitely a warm one, so we'll see...

March Melting

Greetings everyone, I hope your winter has been good and our spring is soon to come...

We have been monitoring the ice that has been around since January on some spots. There are a couple of areas that concern me, #2 being the main one. The ice has built up in the front of the green and caused some water back-up during the 2-3 days we have had in the 40's. We have chipped channels through the ice so the melting water has room to escape and not continue to pool up. It is the only green where this major ice dam has occurred, for the most part the rest of the ice on greens is an inch or so and when it does melt it has places to run off to. We will continue to create openings and places for the water to go so it does not sit on the green surfaces.

We have taken in a couple of turf plugs, from #2 & #4. The one taken from #4 is in fine shape and green-up has been quick. The one from #2 (pictured above) is in ok shape, the poa annua is slower to start which is normal and the bentgrass appears to be similar to #4.

With ice build up we are concerned with two major things, one being suffocation if it covers the turf for extended periods of time (which I have discussed before) and the second is during the freeze/thaw cycles we are now experiencing. If the turf warms up enough the plant can take in water, known as crown hydration. Our concern then is a hard freeze and the water in the plant freezes and shatters the cells. What we do to prevent that is to make sure the water has a place to go as it melts and does not sit on the green. Shovel snow, chip ice, squeegee water, and anything else to help get the ice & water off is what we are doing.

Obviously if there is any damage from the winter we will take all steps in making sure we get turf back as soon as possible. Aerify, topdress, verticut, seed, and even cover in plastic to create mini-greenhouses are just a few of the things that can be done to encourage quick recovery.

Greens Committee Meeting Highlights

We held our first Greens Committee meeting of the year last night. Everyone was present and most of the meeting evolved around the 2009 budget and ideas for planned projects. Nominees for the new committee member position where reviewed and a choice was made. He will be notified by the committee and upon acceptance his name will passed on to the board for approval. The 2009 meeting dates were decided and I have updated the list on the right.

The bulk of our discussion of the evening revolved around the bunker project for 2009 and also various other projects around the golf course. The golf course is going to start facing some interesting times with the economy in the position that it is in. The greens committee feels that even though we are going to be facing some tighter spending limits we can not stop progressing through updates and renovations to the golf course. It is important at a time like this that we continue to improve the golf club, the course being the committees focus obviously, and make sure we are a club that people want to be a part of. On that note we discussed holes #7, 12, and 13 for the bunker renovations this season. If we can fit it into our current budget, those are the holes that will be under renovation around July of this summer.

The other part of the project discussion had to do with tee boxes, from leveling to renovating complexes. We still have a few that are not very level and in need of some attention. We also have some aging timber walls that need to be replaced in the near future. So the committee has set a goal to discuss these areas and put together a plan of attack for them. The other lingering issues have to do with drainage, curbing, and landscaping. Overall it was a good mid-winter refresher about what the course is going to be facing this season and areas that we need to address.

The committee members are listed to the right of this page. If you have any questions, comments, concerns, etc. please make them known so they can be addressed and resolved if need be. And my ear is always open to any of the above, whether you call or email...