The Big Melt

With 60 degree temps and high winds we are finally seeing a substantial amount of melt on the course today.  Wind can do in a few hours what takes a few days with warm temperature alone.

On a day like today, you can definitely identify where/how well water moves on the course, an easy way to find more drainage projects that are needed.  The rate and amount of melt on a given hole says a lot about it's level of exposure and can provide keys on what areas may require additional snow mold or mite protection, winter watering or even what areas we will see green up first.

It's also worth noting that the more snow we receive in an event, the greater the discrepancy between the first and last hole to melt off.  For instance, if we have a couple inches it may only take a few hours for the course to completely clear.  If we get 20", there can be a difference of many weeks between the first hole clearing and when the final snow drift melts off.  It all depends on exposure and soil temps.  The funny thing about our brief discussion today is that they are calling for additional snow tomorrow!  UGGH 

Blazing into the 21st Century

We recently purchased our first flat screen television for our break room....  I know, but our 10 year old JVC was very difficult to see and truly a 170lb safety hazard hanging from the ceiling.   Upon installing our new 46" beauty, we came to the conclusion that we could more efficiently deliver training/safety information via our new television once connected to a PC.

A quick trip to the world wide web yielded a simple hardwired solution from B&H that installed in about 15 minutes.  Now anything we can create, view, play on our computer can be viewed in the break room in beautiful HD.  It should prove to be especially handy for the irrigation design and auditing class we put on for Front Range Community College.  Big thanks to Lance for buying our new flat screen, he always takes care of his employees. 

Crummy picture, but you get the idea.  The converter scales and transmits our monitor signal so that it appears clearly and in the correct aspect ratio on the screen.  Handy little device when a wireless signal isn't available.

Good to know a welder

Last fall, after our first snow of the year, I noticed another pinhole leak in our pump station manifold.  As we have discussed off and on the last year, much of our infrastructure is approaching twenty years old and is definitely showing it's age.  This time the 2" line from our pressure maintenance pump was victim to rusting and possibly electrolysis.  At the most basic level, rust is the result of a reaction between iron and oxygen in water or at least the presence of water, while electrolysis is basically the transfer of current through free ions like sodium.  

The PM pump is a submersible (much like a sump pump in your basement) high pressure pump.  It does exactly what it sounds like, maintains our pressure set point saving wear and tear on our main pumps which are designed to run for extended periods, instead of short bursts.  Anytime we have to make repairs to our pump station, we inspect the condition of the steel pipes, as of late they are not in good condition.  There is a pretty significant amount of rust inside the pipes which is normal with mild steel, but in our case it is accelerated by the high sodium content of our water.  Thus, we are forced to make annual repairs to our pump station plumbing to repair leaks.

Today our leak consists of a pinhole leak in the bottom of a weld.  It is currently a tiny drip, but behind that pinhole leak is a 1-2" cavern in the inside wall of the pipe, and this is what makes fixing these leaks a little more challenging.  The other challenge in this case is actually getting to the area to make a repair...

We are sealed back up for now, hopefully we can make another season without needing more welding on our station.

Quite a storm

No, we aren't shoveling greens quite yet.  Just checking in on a few of our greens to check for snow mold and or an ice layer building up.  As you can see we still have a minimum of 8" of cover on our greens and at this point, we aren't terribly worried about snow mold.  We are still under the protection of our snow mold products (barely) and we had ample time to harden off prior to this storm.  Typically snow mold is far less likely when the turf plant has had the chance to fully harden off and the soil temps have dropped sufficiently prior to extended snow cover.  Certainly not a definitive rule though, there are always exceptions.  If we continue at this rate of melt, we shouldn't expect to open until the end of February/ beginning of March.... Yikes!

Another round of snow

Friday morning we were literally digging our way out of our shop following the latest round of snow here in Westminster.  We haven't had a snow event this big for a couple years.  The snow is supposed to taper off this afternoon, but we are looking at around 16" so far.  The snow came just in time, as many of our south facing slopes were in need of moisture, and pressuring up our system appeared to be eminent.  We were fortunate to finish our irrigation installation on our new tees before the snow started, so when the snow does melt, we can focus on pressuring up our system and tidying up our new tees.  I may be getting a little ahead of myself, as it may take an entire week, just to get our cart path opened up.  The better part of next week will likely be spent cleaning up from this latest snow storm.  

Closer

We have exhausted our supply of fill material for the tees on #16, just shy of what we needed, so after the snow clears, we will haul a few loads of compost from our in house pile out to top off our new tee.  The mounds that used to dot the left side of the cart path are now only a distant memory, thankfully.  We will finish grade this area, spread native seed and lay down some leftover straw mat from another project first thing next week.  Irrigation should follow shortly thereafter.  We are all looking forward to some irrigation work, as it has been a little while since we were able to do more than add/move a head here and there.  Because #11 and #16 are completely new tees, obviously we need completely new irrigation for them.  Our parts are on order, and should be arriving in the next few days.     

#16 Tees

We have started hauling dirt to the site of our new forward tee on #16.  We have determined that it will play approximately 152 yard to the center of the green, shortening the hole by 20 yards for the forward tee players.  To facilitate quicker construction, we will be cutting into native mounds to the left of the cart path on the same hole.  The mounds grow nothing but kochia, so we certainly won't miss them.  We should have this tee completed by the end of the week.  I will post pictures as soon as I have them.  We anticipate installing our irrigation sometime late next week.  We are sharing a trencher with the Heritage, so we can save a little money on rental.  Based on nothing more than a hunch, I think this tee will be the most popular addition of the four we have done this winter.  It shortens a pretty difficult par 3 to a more manageable distance for most players.  i will add pics as soon as I take them.

A touch of moisture

To this point our winter weather has been nothing short of erratic, 60 degrees one day and 30 degrees with snow the next.  We haven't had the extended snow cover we typically experience from December to January, which means we are handwatering greens with our water trailer one day, and shoveling snow the next.  Winter desiccation can happen quite quickly with the strong winds common to the front range and without our irrigation system up and running, we are left to water with a 300 gallon tank mounted on a trailer.  Many courses enjoy irrigation systems with frost free components, we aren't one of those courses.  If we were to pressure up our irrigation system too early and get an extended cold snap, we could sustain a large amount of damage from freezing.  On top of that, most sprinklers aren't really designed to operate under winter temperatures, o-rings shrink, springs are slower, and plastics are much more fragile.  The point is, irrigating is far more challenging in the winter time than it is in the heat of the summertime, so the more snowcover we can maintain, the better.      

Good as new

There are days where working on the course isn't practical or possible due to snow or very cold weather. We are grateful to be busy in the shop cleaning, organizing and building instead of outside freezing our tails off. However one of the least popular tasks that must be completed each winter is repainting course accesories like tee markers and signage.  It won't be long until we will be gearing up for a new golfing season, so the more we can do to prepare, the better off we will be come spring. 

Geese....

One of our fiercest enemies this time of year, aside from mother nature of course is the Canada goose.  Aside from the copious amount of excrement they leave behind, when feeding on grasses Canadian geese tear the entire plant from the ground instead of just the foliage.  If left to feed on a given area too long, a gaggle of geese could consume a tee box in a short amount of time, leaving bare ground and many pounds of excrement behind.
While Canadian geese are traditionally migratory, interbreeding with non-migratory species along with plentiful year round opportunities in areas that were historically seasonal, they have changed their tendencies in recent years.  The last few years we have a tried a number of deterrents, with varying levels of success.  We have found that winter fencing around our lakes along with regular patrols by a staff member is typically enough to minimize our goose damage.

Even on an almost daily basis during winter months we are removing goose "stuff" from our putting surfaces.  After extended snow cover in the past we have had extreme amounts on other playing areas and been forced to drag and blow off the goose "stuff".  While Canadian geese do provide exceptional recreation opportunities in the way of waterfowl hunting, we would ask that no one attempt to harm any of the geese on the golf course.

#11 Tees

In between snow storms we have continued hauling fill material down to #11 tee complex for the addition of another new tee box.  This tee is located directly behind the forward tee which provides a much nicer angle of attack than the current white tee box.  The tee surface will be 1250 sq ft, which is ample teeing ground for a par 5, where the majority of shots are teed up.  Overall we are pretty happy with the look of it and are eager to get it irrigated and grassed.

Dave doing some grade fine tuning with the Lenker rod.

View from the new tee

You can see the current tee at the far left of the picture.  A shot from that tee box demands a high cut which not many high handicappers can play accurately

We plan to build one more tee this winter on #16.  We will discuss that hole in more detail, as there will be changes beyond adding a tee that will change the look and strategy of that hole.  Look for us to start the irrigation installation after the tee on 16 is complete. 

Happy New Year

For the first time in over a month we will have 18 holes open for play this afternoon.  We still have a couple of lingering patches of ice on a few greens that still need to be cleared.  Now that the snow is gone, we have to begin thinking about pressuring up our irrigation system to irrigate in the absence of moisture.  As we mentioned in earlier posts, winter dessication is a serious concern without snow cover and can set in fairly quickly with the warm dry winds we have had the last couple of days.  We try to give mother nature every opportunity to provide natural moisture, but when she fails us we have to rely on our irrigation system.