Llanerch Golf Course and External Activities

The skies have finally cleared but the temperature has dropped. The course is wet and soft. We had to close the course to carts but are evaluating the grounds for carts today. We are planning to roll and mow 9 green later today. The green complex is growing in quite nicely. We might have to mow 18 green because it is growing faster then the other greens over the past month. We will continue to remove and replant some of the horticulture around the clubhouse over the next few weeks.

We have taken the last two days to mow the fairways for the last time for the foreseeable future. We have also kept chasing down those pesky remaining leaves throughout the course. The staff will continue to focus on removing and storing more plants from around the clubhouse. The 9th green has a cover on it to promote root growth over the winter. We will also be adding sand to the 9th approach in hopes of firming up the surface for next year play.

Today, we will winterize the irrigation system. Why? To keep the irrigation water from freezing in the pipes and irrigation heads. We do this by gravity draining the system yesterday. Then we connect compressors to pump air into the system. After enough pressure builds up, we turn on every irrigation head until all the water comes out. We hope to be done today.

The weather is turning rather cold and wet today. It has postponed our ability to clean up the remaining leaves. The staff has moved their efforts towards the clubhouse. They will spend the next few day removing flowers, trees and shrubs from the perimeter of the building. We also had to cut the Boston Ivy that grew on the clubhouse side of 18 because of the renovations. We will replant the ivy after the clubhouse construction is complete.

The over the last two weeks the staff has concentrated on checking sand depth on all green side and a majority of the fairway bunkers. We shoot to have 5 inches of sand throughout the bunkers. When you play, you will notice they are a little "softer". That is because when we relocate the shifting sand to the proper places, the sand becomes "loose". The softness is also a result of not having any substantial rain for over 2 weeks. The staff has also been chasing down leaves on the play surfaces. We will be rolling greens today to provide a smoother surface for the rest of the week. PLEASE fix ball marks on greens. The last few weeks has seen an unexpected increase in unfixed ball marks. The grass is almost dormant and needs your help in healing from ball marks. Unfixed ball marks increase the emergence of poa annua. Thanks for your understanding. I want to wish you and your families a Happy Thanksgiving.  

As you can see in these pictures, we sustained some real tree damage. The course dried out last night and allowed Arader Tree Service to start the cleanup. It will take them at least four days. On the play areas of the course, we are cleaning out fairway bunkers, picking up sticks, blowing leaves and mulching leaves. We are open for play with carts today.  Thanks again for your patience.

The golf course sustained 4.75 inches of rain over 48 hours! The winds knocked a great deal of the leaves out of the trees. Oh, it also knocked down a few trees, too! We have roughly 10 trees down through out the property. Some are along fence lines on Steel Road, Edmounds Avenue and Township Line. Others around tees and greens. Some parts of the black and cyclone fences will need to be replaced. None of the greens, tees or fairways were damaged. The construction on #9 green held up great. We are planning to have our arborist out starting on Monday. We have to wait that long for the course to be dry enough to accommodate the tree trucks. The course will be open for play after 12 noon tomorrow. The carts will only go out if the course continues to dry out over night. I will be adding another update tomorrow. Sorry for the delay. We lost power at the Grounds Maintenance Facility (not restored) and back at my house (just restored). Most importantly, I hope everyone and their ...

   Well, it looks like we are staring right into a Frankenstorm! We are doing all we can to prepare for a storm that might either be epic in proportion or amount to some minor rain. Or something in between! We are preparing the golf course for the worst. We will be applying products today that protect the turf from all the diseases that might result from heavy rain. We are also going to tamp sand down in bunkers in a pursuit of reducing bunker sand wash outs. Staff will be checking all the drain basin to make sure they are clear of debris to promote as much storm water draining into the creeks and ponds as possible. All these tasks will work to some extent but if we get hit hard with several inches of rain over a long time period, it might not be enough. We are just hoping the storm moves away, dissipates or just simply misses us. I believe we will have a better idea on Saturday when the updated forecast models come out.      

Today, we started to sod the fairway and approach on #9. It will probably take close to 2 days to get all the bentgrass sod installed. We will then add the tall type fescue sod. Our goal is to be finished construction by this Friday!

We are spent yesterday adding greens grade soil to the greens complex. The construction company also worked on edging out the fairway bunker. We are spending most of the day preparing the hole for the installation of irrigation. We are planning to smooth out the soil that was built up on the left side on Wednesday and Thursday.

The weather has been very wet which slows down construction but we have been able to keep moving forward. As you can see from this picture, we have shaped out two new bunkers and added drainage. Drainage work is also progressing for the green. Today, if it does not rain, we will finish drainage on the two green side bunkers, add top soil to the surrounds and have 50% of the green drainage done.

The tropical storm that came a few weeks ago created some disease damage to the rough. We have used the last 14 days to slit seed the rough with tall fescue and bluegrass seed. Some of the seed has germinated and we are hoping to see more germination with in the next few weeks. You will also notice that we are using divot mix in the rough on a few hole to "jump start" the seed. As for #9, I am meeting with the golf course architect Stephen Kay today to review the progress of the project. We have to bring in and shape roughly 30 more tri-axles of soil to get the shape that Mr. Kay has designed.  

The construction has begun on 9 green. The construction firm Total Turf has been busy removing all the sod on the green and the surround. We relocated the greens sod onto the range tee for reuse as teeing surface. They have also removed and stock piled the sand from the old bunkers for reuse in the new bunkers. The next few days will focus on shaping out the new green complex. We will use close to 100 tri-axles trucks of soil to build the base. Pictures and more updates will be presented on the blog next week.

The storm that hit all day yesterday and last night dropped close to 2 inches of rain on the course. Some the bunkers had sand washout, a few tree branches fell and we have leaves everywhere. We are currently keeping carts off the course. We will reevaluate around noon.  More details later.

The course is recovering from both 2 inches of rain and aerification. We were able to mow greens, rough and tees today. The fairways are still too wet for mowers. We fertilized some of the greens that seemed to be filling in a little slower than the others. I am still hoping that the greens are 85%-95% healed by the weekend. In the past, the greens have healed in 13-16 days from aerification.

It has been a long time since my last posting. I have been very busy with the outdoor operation and the impending club house renovation. Sorry for the delay. As for the course, we have been fighting the dry weather. It seems to rain all around us but nothing of real for us. We have been concentrating on watering dry spots in the fairways, tees, greens and rough. We have also started to build a new turf nursery of bentgrass beside #5. The rough seems to be holding in considering the lack of rain and the 3rd warmest July on record. We will continue to do a "rain dance" and hope the Mother Nature will give us some well needed rain.

It is day 8 of this oppressive heat wave. If that was not enough, Saturday's forecast is 103 degrees! With no rain in the near future, we are relying on the irrigation system to help us keep the grass cooled off. As you play, you will see irrigation heads popping up throughout the course. That is just is again a way for us to syring larger areas of turf. We will being keeping the rollers in the shop this weekend to protect the greens. I hope everyone enjoys their weekend and don't forget to drink plenty of water.

As we enter the fourth day of extreme weather, the staff and I are changing to a more "defensive" mode. We will continue to complete our daily routines but really focus on disease and water management. The turf will be getting a both irrigation at night and hand watering in concentrated dry spots during the day. We will also be scouting for the development of all turf related diseases. The hope is for the hot spell to end sooner than later!

Just when you think it can't get any hotter then yesterday, we get a forecast like today. The weather websites are calling for temperatures close to 99 degrees, high humidity with a few clouds. We plan to do many cycles of syringing of greens today to cool the grass down. The weather is scheduled to "cool" down by Saturday. 

It continues to amaze me where readers live who view this blog. In October of 2011, we had over 27 countries on the list. Since then we have the following to add: Iceland, Spain, Czech Republic, Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, Hong Kong, Qatar, Malaysia, Israel, Cote d' Ivoire, Bangladesh, Guam, Monaco, Mongolia, Turkey, Trinidad and Tobago, China, Norway, Ghana, South Africa, Georgia, Sweden, Belgium, Denmark, Nepal and Algeria. I want to again to thank everyone from all countries for reading the blog. I hope you enjoy it.

We received almost 1.5 inches of rain in the past 24 hours. We have some very wet areas especially on 5,1,7 and 10 fairway. That being said, we will have carts after 10:00am today. This "extra" time lets the fairways and rough drain some more. Please exit to the cart paths when you see the green and white stakes. This includes not driving in the rough in the rough after the stakes, please. If you have any questions, please contact the Golf Shop. We hope to you enjoy your round of golf today.

  Looks like rain might be coming tomorrow. We are currently below the average for the amount of rain fall at this time of year. That is not to say that it has been very hot, also. The golf course has handled the weather well but could use a good old fashion rain. We are preparing for potential rain by applying sand to low areas in some fairways. 13 tee is growing in quite nicely. We are hoping to open it within the next 7 days.

As you can see from this picture, we are continuing the practice of topdressing fairways with straight sand. The sand helps to smooth the playing surface. It also improves drainage, protects the turf from mower scalping and improves the soil profile. We either blow or broom the sand "into" the turf canopy.

As we enter the Memorial Day weekend, the course is been very busy. It is a little wet out from the 0.33 inches of rain we received over the last 24 hours. We have been concentrating on daily preparation of the course for daily play. We are wrapping up the 13th tee and the sod is growing in well. We are also turning our attention on growing in a nursery green just to the left of 5 green complex. We have some minor tree trimming and mulching of some beds on the list over the next few weeks. I hope we see you out playing. Enjoy the holiday weekend!

The course has really "greened up" from the over 2.2 inches of rain we received this week! The rough is growing like....rough in May...thick and dense. We are putting as much effort as possible to keep the rough at a manageable playing height. We just sodded the surround of the new 13th tee. We plan to finish it by Tuesday of next week. I am hoping to open it by no later than the third week of June. I want to thank everyone for fixing ball marks and divots. Every little bit of help in this department really improves the quality of the course.

We are moving forward with the construction of 13 tee. It will add roughly 23 yards to the overall length of the hole. This picture shows soil being shaped to become the outside part of the tee. Next week, we will add irrigation and drain to the actually tee surface.

Here is a photo of the new pavers that were installed at the back entrance of the pool. This is a big upgrade over the previous mulch based path. We will be planting grass seed around the board of the pavers later today. The pavers match the ones that were installed by the Midway and the tennis courts. 

Finally after weeks of dry and windy conditions, we got some rain! The course received over 2.2 inches of rain last Sunday. We are hoping for some more in the near future. In the mean time, we have been redistributing the sand in all the green side bunkers to ensure a more even playing surface. We will continue this work in the fairway bunkers over the next two weeks. Most of the other time has been spent on mowing the ever thickening rough. It is that time of year when the rough goes from thin and uneven to thick and lush. Next week we will trim some trees, topdress greens and groom the fairways.  

Mother Nature refuses to give us any rain. As a result, the course is playing firm and fast. We expect a dry warming trend over the next five days to continue producing these playing conditions. It is forcing us to rely on the irrigation system to administer adequate moisture for the grass plants. After we started the restoration seven months ago,we are only one day away from the opening of  #18! The green is getting closer to the other greens when it comes to putting speed but is still a bit slower. We hope that in the next few months that the green speed will match the others. Please feel free to tell me your opinions after you have played it. Enjoy the Opening Day weekend!

Today, we are fighting the wind. We have had sustained winds of 26mph and gusts as high as 37mph! As any one who has played the course in the last few days could tell you, the course is playing firm and fast! Some rain any time from Mother Nature would be very much appreciated. Today, we are edging out some over grown bunkers on 6 green complex, watering sod, removing small dots of poa annua on 3 green and laying sod on the old cart path on #5.

The 18th green restoration is moving forward. We plan to open the hole on Saturday the 14th. The green has grown in well but is still putting a little slower compared to the other greens. We will be working all next week to get the green to "speed up" some more. As for the fairway and approach, the grass is ready for play. The rough needed some sod in the weaker areas. There might be some "uneven" lies when comparing the established rough to the sod. As the season progresses, we will try to grow a more "consistent" play surface. I appreciate everyone's patience as we complete this project. Happy Easter to everyone and their families.

Last year, it seemed like it rained every day from August to November. This spring has been extremely dry. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration or NOAA has posted a special weather warning know as "Red Flag" because of the low humidity combined with high winds and sunny days. The "Red Flag" symbolizes a need for greenkeepers to be diligent in applying water to the turf. A common mistake is to think that because its not "hot", the turf will be fine without irrigation.  Dry conditions can do just as much damage at 55 degrees as 90 degrees. So when you see irrigation running on the course, this post will hopefully explain why we are doing it.

The contractor is almost done building the new cart path on #18. They completed the extension of the cart path on the right side of #9 yesterday. They will be adding a new cart path on the left side of #5 green by the end of the week. We, on the other hand, are mow greens, fairways, rough and doing divots on par 3 tees. The plan for next week is start sodding the construction wounds in the rough on 18 while continuing to prep the course for play. 

As I write this blog entry, the course looks like it is located in London, England. We expect the fog to burn off  by noon. We are busy rolling greens, weeding bunkers, spraying fertilizer, sweeping the rough, cleaning up stump grindings, weeding flower beds and cutting some new cups. The fairways aerification was completed on Monday. Next few days will center on fertilizing as much of the course that we can, weather dependent. The fertilizer will help to establish the root system and begin the recovery process from aerification. As for projects, cart path work started on the 18th yesterday and then the contractor will be fixing the cart path by 5 green and extending the path on 9. I can't thank the winter Grounds Maintenance Staff (all 6 of them!) enough for their hard work. With all the warm weather, our work load has doubled. They have really pushed hard to deliver the best course they can. We are counting down the days until the H2B Visa employees come back on April 2 to help ...

Any superintendent who tries to maintain a clean stand of bentgrass will tell you poa annua or "poa" is the enemy. It is an annual grass that produces seed for about 8 months a year and then dies. It is considered a weed by superintendents because of its poor overall quality. Quite frankly, I despise this grass. It is probably my number one concern and we work all year to keep it in check but I need your help! This picture (CLICK on it) will show you a poa plant inside an unfixed divot from 15 fairway. I can not say it enough, PLEASE replace your divot and fix ball marks on greens. This is how the poa invades the stand of bentgrass. I can't begin to explain how hard it is to remove it without hurting the existing bentgrass. I appreciate all the help you can lend us.  

Back on March 7th, we started to fill the irrigation pipes with water. We had a few irrigation leaks but overall the system is in very good shape. We hope to have the system at 100%  by Monday. We were also able to aerify, topdress, roll and fertilize all the greens by the end of the day yesterday. This photo shows the irrigation system being used to water in the fertilizer into the soil profile. We are doing all this work a week to ten days early because we have had such a warm March. We hope we can see you out on the course so you too can enjoy this great weather.

The 18th green is right on schedule. It has benefited from the mild winter. We continue to lower the mowing height slowly and add sand topdress to smooth the surface. The cart path is scheduled to be adjusted more to towards the creek in the next few weeks. We are still planning to have the hole open by April 15th.

Next week will have some unusually warm temperatures. This is a great opportunity for us to start aerifying. We plan to aerify greens on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. The course will be open for play on Tuesday and Wednesday but closed on Monday. We plan to fill the aerification holes with sand and roll them so they are smooth for play. The aerification holes will be medium in size. Normally, the greens take 10-17 days to completely heal, depending on the weather. Thanks for your patience.

As we start the month of March, the plugging of poa annua continues. For last few days, the Assistant Superintendents have been taking bentgrass plugs from the turf nursery and replacing any poa on the green surface. We have a very low population of poa (which is a weed) but we have to try to keep it all out. The majority of poa that germinates is a result of unfixed ball marks. I can not stress it enough that we need everyone to fix ball marks. Thanks for helping! 

We have just finished another improvement to the Midway. We removed the slate walkways and concrete with astro-turf and replaced it with pavers. As you can see when you click on the photo, it is a big improvement to the area. The pavers match the other pavers we installed last year over by the tennis area. We will also be adding some new plants and flowers in the near future. 

This was the way the course looked just a few days ago but how things have change! The course is open today for play with carts starting at 10:30. There be some minor patches of snow but no enough to stop "winter golf". If you have any questions, please contact the Golf Shop. Enjoy!

Last week, we worked on the left side fairway bunker on #16. Many players felt the bunker was a little "hidden" or was a "blind" bunker. That led us to raise the back side of the bunker by 4 feet. That gave use the ability to flash the sand an addition 3 feet. New sand has been added and compacted. Now players can easily see the bunker after their tee shot.

With all this warm weather, we decided to start doing some addition spring tasks now. This is a picture of an area that we are preparing for sod. The sod we will use for the intermediate cut is a low cut bluegrass. This part of the intermediate cut on #1 was remove due to some invasion of  bentgrass and poa annua . The sod will proved a better playing surface and be more aesthetically appealing. As for the rest of the golf course, we continue to trim trees and removed some dead trees. We are planning to replant trees in late March and/or early April. 

Today's post marks the first one of the 2012 season. We have spent the new year cleaning up tree stump grindings, applying sand on 18 green, 18 approach and the 1st tee putting green. We also continue to trim trees and remove dead and/or decaying trees. We plan to plant some new trees on property in the late winter early spring. I also would like to thank everyone who has visited the blog over last year. I hope it has become a good source of information about the happenings on the course. With that said, I wish everyone has Happy and Health New Year.