August 2017 – Shane Wright, CGCS

Dear Member,

We are entering the Back 9 of the summer and your golf maintenance staff is hard at work preparing the course for the upcoming winter golf season. The greens have been aerified twice and will be deep tined aerified September 11. The tine used for this process goes to a depth of 11 inches and aids in drainage and air movement in the greens profile. This should soften the greens (I’ve heard the “greens are too firm” comments). Our standard aerification tine goes about 3.5 inches deep. Tees and fairways have also been verticut and aerified twice this summer. Roughs will be aerified in September.

The greenside bunker project is right on budget and schedule. We have completed all Back 9 bunkers and #1 and #9 greenside bunkers to date. This week we started on #8 and #7 greenside bunker (right). Our course architect John Sanford (President of American Society of Golf Course Architects) has been part of the process as well as the Course and Grounds Committee. John comes up every 3 weeks and designs the bunkers in the field and we rebuild the bunker to his specifications. On his next visit he inspects the completed bunkers and “tweaks” any necessary revisions. We then go over the work load for the next visit. It’s been a very fun and educational experience working with John.

We initially were going to install capillary concrete liner for the project, but eliminated this after John recommended that we could design bunkers to reduce rain washouts without the liner. This is where the grass “bull nose” edge has come into the design. We have eliminated high sand flashings that were prone to washouts and bunker contamination by bringing the sod down more flush to sand. John also has reduced the size of some of the large bunkers. The bunkers on #14 are about 35% smaller. Please remember to stay off of new sodded areas for the next few months while sod heals. Please treat as ground under repair and drop outside sod line.

Projects Completed

All Back 9 green side bunkers, #1 &9 green side bunkers

*We have started on 8 green side bunker and #7 right green side bunker this week

Fence installed at #18 green and rightside #11.

Croquet Lawn and Putting green right of #10 Tees

Mixed Grille landscape improvement

Men’s Grille landscape improvement

14 Bunkers below were reduced by 35%