Hydraulic Oil Damage

Unfortunately On Saturday morning we had a hydraulic leak on one of the greens mowers. We sustained damage to the 8th green on the Masters course and 1 & 4 greens on the U.S. Open course. Hot hydraulic oil is very detrimental to plant health and we will suffer some turf loss. Hydraulic leaks are not easy to see as you are mowing, especially when we start our mowing in the dark. Fortunately we are not to far away from our spring aerification ( Mid March ), Aerification and spring grass growth will help heal the damage but until then we will have to wait for recovery.  

Tournament of Champions

On Saturday the Braemar Men's Club held it's annual Tournament of Champions. To be eligible to participate in this event you must have won at least one tournament in the past year and also competed in five events. The overall winner of the TOC is the low net score no matter what flight you are in. The event was held on the Western and Masters course's. 

The Trophy

( left to Right ) Tom Ingram, Craig Courtney, Johnathan Noori

Frank Vidak, John Turnbull

Daniel Dutil, Bill Ackerman, Jeff Heller

Nathan Sand, David Mizrahi ( TOC Champion ), Matt Barash

Max Falamaki, Stephen Kirsch, Ed Gradinger

Zhavier Fox, Shy Kalaydjian, Sandy Freeman

Kim Bunnell, Mike Genewick, Jeffery Rosen

Lionel Cassini, Kenneth Goodfried, Brian Stark

Laszlo Furdek, Ephraim Barsam

David Phillips, Mitch Mulbarger, Robert Nary

Howard Rubin, Alex Hammill ( General Manager ), Dan Lennon

Gerald Eskelin, Vishnu Ramyead, Robert Ballard

Andrew Valdivia, Bob Tullio

Ron Sobol, Jim Nitz, David Sparks

Larry Hart, Rick Gregory ( not competing )

The Starters on the first tee:

Branden Zett ( 1st Assistant Pro ), Rick Gregory ( Men's Club President ), Seth Jamison ( Director of Golf )

Clubhouse Landscape Improvements

A small cosmetic upgrade done recently at the clubhouse by one of my golf course maintenance employees, Ramon Solano.

Before

 After

Rainfall stats

I would like to share some rainfall stats with you to help put into prospective the challenges we have faced this year, both during the summer months and through the fall overseed. 

2013 was the driest calendar year in recorded history. The normal rainfall is 13.98 inches and this year we only had 3.60 inches. That's .5 inches less than the previous lowest year in 1957. In December alone we only had .23 inches on a monthly average of 2.76 inches.

Nothing is as good as rainfall. All the irrigation in the world will not deliver the same results as natural rainfall. Irrigation water is full of  minerals and salts that can become harmful to turf grass health unless we get rainfall to help flush and cleanse the soil.

The pictures below were taken today, December 31, 2013. It may not have the same look as it did last year at this time but it does show that my golf course maintenance crew are doing a great job even with all the challenges mother nature throws at us.

Happy New Year and I look forward to a great 2014.

Fairways on the Western Course

Western Course Fairways: Holes 2-8

In an effort to improve summer playing conditions, Braemar Country Club has decided to discontinue overseeding the fairways on holes 2-8 on the Western Course. We feel these holes have a healthy enough turf stand that withholding overseeding will promote a better playing surface in the summer months.

Although the appearance of those fairways may not be aesthetically pleasing, we do have good turf coverage going into the winter months. The off color appearance of these fairways is due to the warm season grasses going into dormancy.

The benefits of not overseeding will help the warm season grasses out-compete the cool season rye grass. This process over an extended period of time (4-5 years) will result in better summer playing conditions. Based on the fact that the playing season for the great majority of golfers is in the summer months, we feel that this decision is in the best interest of the membership as a whole.

You can help in this process of improving our fairways. Please avoiding driving through wet areas if there are not cart path restrictions and when cart paths only, please observe our request and stay on the cart paths.

Thank you for your cooperation! 

2013 Aerification/Overseeding Update

We are two thirds of the way complete with this years overseeding/greens aerification process.

The center course was completed two weeks ago and is starting to fill in and take on a good stand of ryegrass for the winter season. The greens are not far from being back and with the days getting shorter the green speeds will increase ( growth rate slows way down ).

The west course will reopen tomorrow, Saturday October 5. This year we did not overseed the fairways on holes 2 through 8 but did overseed the rough, tees and surrounds. Holes 1 and 9 were overseeded completely. The fairways on the west course have a good stand of warm season grasses, mostly likely due to the lack of overseeding in the past when the course was 36 holes. To keep overseeding them will eventually weaken the turf and the result is weaker fairways in the summer months. The fairways will not have a great aesthetic look over the winter months but the end result will be a better surface in 2014 summer playing season.

The east course will close next week for two weeks and reopen on October 19. This will complete the process for this season.

Please observe the carts on path rules. Currently the center and west course are carts on paths ( all holes ) until further notice and the east course will be carts on paths after reopening until turf conditions allow carts off paths.

Thank you for patience during this process.

David

Turf Improvement

Over the past few months our maintenance staff has continued working on turf improvement projects that we face every year in the summer months. Even though it has been a cool July and August to date, the lack of winter and spring rain has created additional challenges this year. With the lack of early season rainfall to flush the salts below the turfgrass root zone, the turf has accumulated an excessive amount of salt build up which inhibits the turfgrass getting adequate water to maintain it's health ( salt holds 50 times it's own weight in water ). With the lack of rainfall and a cool summer the warm season grasses have not had optimal conditions for substantial growth. We will continue with our sodding program to improve turf conditions until we begin to prepare for the fall overseeding.

# 2 fairway on the center course

 The approach on # 1 east course

The approach on # 3 center course