13 tee project complete

The construction of the new forward tee on hole #13 is now complete.  As we discussed in in the earlier post, New forward tee #13, this will be a big improvement for people playing from the forward tee as they will not have to hit up the hill, and sometimes even watch their ball roll back down to them.

The tee was constructed with native soil so it would match the other tees on the golf course and play  and feel the same.  Then 1" sand was laid over the top of the soil and the sod that was used was grown on a sand based media that we had seeded last year in our nursery.  The purpose of this was to keep all the tees the same, as our current tees on the course have a 3" sand layer that we built up on top of the native soil from 5 years of topdressing.  Now this tee has 3" of sand with turf that is growing in sand and it should have the same feeling and traction as the tees on the rest of the course.

Native soil being placed and compacted

Grading native soil

Sand capping the tee

Sodding

View from the tee as the hole will play

As soon as the soil temperature warm up and things start to grow we will roll the tee, topdress, and fertilize it.
The new hole #13 will will play 350 yards as a Par 4, and we will move #14 back to play as a par 5 at 426 yards.  These two tees should be open for play by ladies member-guest, The RockChuck, on May 2.

Winter pics

Some great pictures of the course this morning after the small snowfall last night.  Shows the soil temps of sand based areas (greeens) is warmer than the soil based areas.

Greens Plugs

One thing we do over the winter to monitor how the turf is doing while dormant and frozen, is to take plugs out of the greens, bring them in the maintenance facility and plant them, and cover them to simulate a greenhouse effect.  This triggers the plant to come out of dormancy, and is a way for us to forecast what we should expect over the next month.

The planted plug with a simulated greenhouse

The plug up close

This is great to see and gives us a sense of relief once the soil starts to warm up and the turf comes out of dormancy.  It has been a colder winter, with more moisture and frozen conditions than in the past.  Coupled with the winter traffic that we put on the dormant turf and frozen soil, it is always a concern on how the turf is doing over the winter.

Things are looking good for 2014.

New forward tee #13

We also have began the construction of the new forward tee on #13.  This was always a very difficult hole for our ladies as they started with an uphill tee shot out of the hole.

Above I am standing on the old tee box and you can see their dislike of this tee shot, the new tee under construction is on the top left.

Here is a view from their new tee location toward the green.

Standing on the new tee looking back down at the old tee, you can see the improvement this will bring to get them up to the top of the hill.  It will take about 125 yards off the hole and make it a Par 4 instead of a par 5, but after sitting down withe the ladies association it is very worth it and will make that hole much more enjoyable.  We are in discussion about moving the forward tees back on #14 to make that a par 5 instead of a par 4, it would gain back the 125 yards and maintain the par 72 for the course.

The site of the new tee staked out

Cutting the end of the cartpath for removal

Removing the cartpath and sod, prepping the site

Starting to bring in dirt

The tee is rough shaped in

We will continue to work on the tee for the next few days and should have it sodded by next week.

Bathroom remodel complete

In the last week we have completed our remodel of the bathrooms on course.  Things always are more work once you get into them, but now they look very good and will last for a long time in the outdoor conditions due to the material that we used.

Here are some before pictures of what we started with:

 

Snow - melt

Just like the rest of the country, this winter has been one of our snowiest and coldest in many years. We normally can play golf all year around here in the banana belt of northern ID, but this year we have been closed 42 days since Nov 1.

Recently we had 3" on last Thursday night, 3" on Friday night, and 4" on Saturday night.

Much needed moisture as the golf course was starting to get dry due to our dry fall and lack of rain

Expecting to be closed for another week or so was the feeling at the beginning of the week, then we got another interest phenomenon that happens around here and a warm chinook wind blew in from the south on Monday, coupled with a few small rain events and the course turned to complete slush and all the snow melted in 24 hours.

We kept a very close eye on the greens to see if we needed to squeegee and remove water from the greens as the snow was melting to prevent any water/slush from standing on the greens overnight and freezing, causing damage to the turf.  Things are very sensitive when you have free water sitting on the green.  Crown hydration, which is when the plant absorbs free water, the water expands when it freezes, and leads to rupturing of the cell wall.  This can happen in one night and could kill the plant if it froze that night.  Fortunately our night time temperatures have stayed above freezing so our turf is doing well.
The next day brought lots of water sitting on frozen ground due to the single digit lows and hi's near 15 that we had for 4 days prior to the snow storms.  This frozen ground prevented the water from soaking in.

The last two days have been above 50, which pulled the frost out of the ground allowing the water to soak in and drain off.  The course is now open again and playing well.

Winter Flowers

During this stretch of the coldest period of our winter so far I thought I would take a look at our winter flowers.  Remember last fall we planted numerous flowers that would actually bloom over the winter and very early spring months.  I felt the golf course had good "color" during spring, summer, and fall of the growing season, but we were lacking during the winter period.  There are not many, but there are some plant types that do flower in the cold winter months in our region.  Last week after that rain event some of those flowers started to form buds and we should see them around the course for the next couple months.

Up close of the Helleborus 'Josef Lemper', 

Interesting to see everything dormant around it, and then green leaves and a blooming flower

Look for them over the next two months in the landscape tee beds, along with an orange Heauchera, 'Peach Flambe', which will be blooming  soon.