The Courses are in full bloom and the turf is Growing especially the Rough!
What better time than now for our Rough mowers to break down on the Heritage course.
Both minor fixes but both are specialized parts that have to be ordered (no jimmy rig'in these).
We will send the Greywalls rough units over to save the day on the Heritage tomorrow, if we waited until the parts arrive the entire rough would be Native height :)

Our latest Duck Crew at the Greywalls Irrigation Pond

Member who thought his cart turned into Bubba Watson's Hoover-craft cart over the winter!

Andy and Clay to the rescue.  No one injured and our main man even finished his round.  

The Heritage guys completed an extension of the fairway drain on #2 Fairway.  

The original drain was put in 2 years ago and has provided wonderful results.  This wet spring identified a need to extend that pipe.

 'Super Dave' Mowen and Morgan 'The Animal' dig the drench in the rain.  

Great Job by the crew finishing the job on a real crappy day.  

An Outstanding performance!

We got out and performed a light vertical mowing to the Greywalls greens and approaches.  This was followed by a crew blowing clumps then a light drag with a cocoa-fiber mat before a final mowing.  

This process will help get more light into the turf canopy and further aid our winter recovery process.

We plan on doing the same to the Greywalls Tees this week.  

The Heritage will be completed next week 

 Before V-cut

 After V-cut

 Blowing clumps

Drag Mat used to drag the greens

Our New Heritage Greens mower has arrived!  The 'H' crew is really looking forward to this unit!

Pictured above is Mike, he really looks good in pastel clothing

I am sure many of you have noticed the tree pruning going on at the Heritage course.  We purchased a pole saw this off season and it is getting a wonderful work out.  Keep up the great work Andy!!!!

The Heritage signs are officially complete!!!!

It has been a long time coming but they are finished and several holes are open for sponsors!

Contact myself or Marc if you are interested in a 3-year sponsorship!

Mario aka 'Butch' did a wonderful job this spring Rocking out the solid tine aerification on the Greywalls Fairways.  Pictured here on #18 the last hole to complete.  

New Porti-potties have arrived and they are an upgrade.  We look forward to them being serviced early in the morning before golfers arrive.

Pictured here is the new location between holes #13 and #15 on Greywalls.  

Now this unit is not in the sun and is accessible from two holes.    

The boys tackled the hill on #18 Greywalls.  No small task to climb and cut!

We added a drain on Greywalls next to #14 green in the approach valley to the right.  This is was an area of excessive moisture retention that needed to be addressed.   

' The Doc' in Blue leading new staffers Chris and Matt

 This water will now travel down the pipe and leave the area

 The guys love laying pipe.  Nothing better than an early season projects to build crew morale and confidence as everyone gets to know each other and works as a team.  

 'The Doc' completing some turf mending

New guys Mike B. and Kevin were a fine support staff for 'The Doc' (front and center)

Great work fellas!!

Heritage Irrigation is now up and going.  

One week, 8 broken heads, one bad hydraulic tube, one broken pipe, one leaky foot valve and one malfunctioning booster pumps later it is hold strong.   

 Andy and Clay in action next to #2 Green

 Andy found the issue

A Leaky hydraulic control tubing

Today we will be starting up the Heritage irrigation system - always an adventurous time.  

 A view back to #11 Heritage from #12 Green

Lake view vista would be fantastic with out those conifers.  

On Friday I over-seeded the winter damaged areas on Greywalls with T-1 bentgrass.  The previous day we double spiked all of the greens and opened up little holes for the bentgrass to fall into for germination.      

 Spreader and seed

We are also completing an irrigation audit/head trimming and a solid tine aerification to the fairways.  These two things are impossible to complete with any efficiency after we open so we are busting our humps to get it done now.

Solid Tine aero-vator in action on #10 Greywalls.  

I started up the Greywalls irrigation system on Monday because we had to get water on our sand based greens to begin recovery.  

As you can see the #15 bridge continues to move/settle.  Over the winter it moved so much that it pulled the gasket joint coupling off.  Two floor jacks, four screw drivers, needle nose pliers, an adjustable wrench, a couple blocks of wood, a hammer and some not so nice words later the problem was corrected.  

 Leaking!

Repaired

We have the irrigation system up and going on Greywalls to start the recovery process on these damaged areas.  As you can see the turf is already starting to recover.  It is just going to take time.  

There is still lots of green plant crowns so all hope is not lost.  

 #12 Green Greywalls last week after snow melt

#12 Green Greywalls May 8th

#12 Green Greywalls May 17th Healing indeed

#12 Green Greywalls May 29th

Today we cut the Fairways for the first time on both golf courses.  We must drag the Heritage Fairways first to knock down the late fall-winter-spring worm castings before we mow them.  

The worm population on Greywalls is minimal so this step can be eliminated.  

The first cut help promote active growth by cutting off the brown tips and leaving more green material exposed to the sun to begin photosynthesis.  

These are some pictures of Winter kill on the Heritage Course.  The dead turf is Poa annua the live green turf is Creeping Bentgrass.  These are fine examples of why I favor the growth of bentgrass over Poa.  We have been overseeding bentgrass on the Heritage in select areas for 6 years now.  We will never gain a 100% bentgrass surface but a nice mix is wonderful.  10 years ago this area would have been completely wiped out but now there is hope and life because the bentgrass exists on the surface in larger percentages.  

 Close up of #7 Heritage green

 #7 Green Heritage

#7 Green Heritage

First Cut

Our first cut on the Heritage took place Wednesday afternoon.  After blowing off the surface we use a set of brush reels to clean them up.  We then follow that up with a different mower, which has a set of thick bladed sand reels.  This cleans up the debris and larger sand particles left on the surface from our heavy fall sand topdressing (completed for winter crown protection).  

Our next step is to raise the height on our daily mowing reels and mow at that turf level until winter recovery is complete.  Its like starting new every spring.  

We will complete this on Greywalls early next week

Brush Reel on #12 Heritage

Mowing #12 Heritage

#14 Heritage must be walk-mowed for the first few weeks every spring because it is so wet.  

The Big Melt

The melt off over the weekend (April 27th-28th) was massive.  2-4 feet of snow melted in about 24 hours and there were rivers everywhere.  It was spectacular to see a rush of (2 foot deep rivers) water coming from the Hills to the South of #12 and flowing across the fairways!

River across #13 Fairway Greywalls

Waterfall #4 Tee Greywalls

My son Boden playing in the extreme runoff on #14 greywalls

My Son Jace chasing Boden down the runoff river

The wetland between #14-#16 Grewalls from Fairway to Fairway

A stinky situation found on #14 Tee Greywalls

Pictures say a thousand words

You can easily see my spray lines below from last fall.  They show the importance of our fall fungicide application.  Unprotected turf gets overrun with snow-mold in Marquette and takes much longer to grow in the spring of the year.  Lower cut turf like fairways and especially greens face death from this pathogen while the longer cut rough has a much higher survival rate. 

#13 Fairway Greywalls (left side)

#13 Fairway Greywalls closer to the Green (right side)

#4 Fairway Greywalls

#5 Forward Tee Greywalls is not only level now but survived very well

#10 Green Heritage.  My one pass around the green when spraying Approaches.  Can you tell where my boom ended?