New Year and Project Updates

Well I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas with your family and friends like I did with my mine. Things have been a little slower around here this past week with the holiday and vacation time, but we are back at it today working outside enjoying some sunshine. We have been continuing our work on the bunkers on #5 green and hope to have the grading work completed today before the next round of below freezing temperatures arrives. Also we are starting to do some logistics work for the #5 creek project (hauling dirt for temporary damns, clearing native areas for equipment access, installing barrier fence, etc.) getting the final details taken care of, so that once we get the final go ahead to start from the State we are ready to go. The permitting process has been a long process, but hopefully we are getting down to the end and will hear something shortly. Another project we are going to try to start work on is the drainage installation on #16 fairway. If the weather holds and conditions stay like they are we hope to possibly start sometime this week or early next. During this last batch of wet weather it looks like our new drain lines in #14 fairway have been working like we hoped. This area has been noticeably drier and there hasn't been any standing water on the grass like there has been in the past so this should really help our turf conditions in this area. Lastly I just want to thank all of you for your support of our maintenance team in 2014 and helping to make it one of the best yet! As the New Year arrives this week we are excited for 2015 and are eagerly looking forward to making it even better than last year here at Wolf Creek! I hope everyone has a safe and awesome New Year and I look forward to seeing all of you in 2015!

Good Moisture Going Into Christmas Time

Our weather pattern over the last couple of weeks has shifted pretty significantly and we have been getting some much needed moisture that will really help us as we move into the colder months of our winter. Last year at this time we didn't receive very much moisture at all and then the harsh cold temperatures hit and caused us problems due to the dry soil conditions. Looking ahead it looks like temperatures are going to start dropping and winter weather is suppose to move into the area over the next week with single digit temperatures and some snow and ice. Due to all the recent moisture we are going to start finally draining our irrigation system to try and prevent any freezing issues in the coming weeks. Also today we are going to be finishing up picking up debris where we cut down a few trees, changing the cups on the greens, and continue to work on the bunkers on #5. We hope to get a few of these projects completed before the temperatures drop. I hope each and every one of you have a very Merry Christmas with your family and friends! Thank you all for your support in 2014 and we are very excited for what's in store for 2015. Merry Christmas!!

Snow and Winter Weather

Finally we got our first measurable snowfall of the winter of 2014 overnight dropping 2"-3" in our area. I attached a picture of the golf course this morning showing the snow accumulation. The roads were a little slick this morning coming into work but have since cleared off nicely as the snow was more of a wet slushy snow than a real dry fluffy snow that tends to be around longer. It doesn't look to hang around long as temperatures are forecast to be in the 40's and 50's by early week next week before our next cold front hits during the middle of the week. On Monday when the temperatures were warm we were able to get out and mow the greens cleaning up the putting surfaces and rolling out the footprints that were present from all of the freeze thaw that we have been having. Also we were able to get out and get the bunkers all raked after last weekends rain and continue blowing the leaves. This week, as the weather has allowed, we have continued to work on the bunkers on #5 green complex installing the new liner and putting in new sand. Over time the old sand has built up around the edges of the bunkers from all the sand that is splashed out from golfers, blown around from the wind, and moved around from raking causing us to have to do some regrading of the bunker edges and faces to bring them back down to the original grade. I attached a picture below showing the white sand build up on top of the original soil grade. We hope to get the bunkers finished as soon as the weather cooperates and gets warm enough to allow the glue to dry. Have a great weekend!

Project Work

The weather continues to take us on a roller coaster ride. High temperatures were in the 50's to 60's over the weekend and the first of the week and then we are now experiencing temperatures in the 30's with the forecast later in the week for temps to once again warm up into the upper 50's to 60's. Also over the last weekend we received some much needed rainfall. All sites around the golf course showed we got about 1" of rain which was very well received by the turf and trees. On Monday we were able to get out in the morning and mow the greens. We actually removed quite a bit of leaf tissue which really helped clean them up and make them play a little better. If the weather pattern holds true our plan is to try and put the small roller on them on Friday to try and get the footprints rolled out after they have softened up from all the freeze/thaw cycles we have been having. Also on Monday we started our bunker renovation work on #5. We are going to be installing the same liner and sand in the bunkers that we used on #12,13,and 18 a year and half ago. This will help these bunkers play more consistently in the future and will keep the white sand nice and clean and not allow it to get contaminated with the silt and debris that our old bunkers do. I have attached a picture below of one of the bunkers after we have pulled all the old sand out and we are getting ready to start installing the new liner. We are still waiting final approval from the State of Kansas to begin our project on #5. I will continue to keep everyone updated as I hear any new information. We are also continuing to work on the removal of the dead trees in various spots around the golf course that we identified at the end of the season. Getting these trees removed has really helped clean up some of these areas making them more appealing to the eye and helping us with getting some more air and sunlight down to the turf. I hope everyone has a great week and I hope to see all of you soon!

Burning Brush

We finally got the clearance from the local fire department to allow us to start burning some of our accumulated brush piles around the golf course from the removal of dead trees. As you can see from the picture below we had a pretty good looking fire going this morning. Also this morning we are out putting down our last green spray application of the year. We are applying our last pre-emergent product to help with poa annua germination and are applying a product that will help keep our greens hydrated during the cold windy winter weather. It looks like we are going to get some much needed rainfall over the the next day or two, which will really help out the dry conditions that we are dealing with right now. #14 fairway drainage project was finally completed this week. Just in time before a big rain storm. Like I have been saying this should really help this area to drain and be a more consistent playing surface. During this upcoming stretch of warmer weather we are going to start redoing the bunkers on #5 green. We are going to install the new bunker liner that we used last year along with new sand. This will help us on our plan of getting our bunkers more consistent and create better playing surfaces. It will also help us during big rain events as the liner helps hold the sand in place and doesn't allow it to do a lot of washing out. This eliminates a lot of time for my staff when we are repairing them after the storms. Have a great week!

A Lot to Be Thankful For

Weather conditions over the past week or so have been a lot warmer then we had at the beginning of the month. Highs have been quite a bit warmer which has actually allowed us to get some much needed things done on the golf course this week. Since we have had warmer temperatures the ground finally thawed this week which allowed us to mow our greens on Monday and clean them up. Also we were finally able to change the hole locations, which this time a year becomes a challenge with the hard freezes as the greens are usually the first things to freeze. I had some questions from last weekend as some of you saw my staff out hand watering the greens and you are wondering why that was occurring? It has been a while since we have received any significant rain and the winds have been blowing rather steady over the last month or so drying out the surface. Under these conditions greens tend to dry out considerably due to the lack of moisture and windy conditions. Also this time of year the greens get very soft due to the freeze thaw cycle that they go through. Even if they are soft in areas, there are areas that are hydrophobic and are extremely dry. If we don't water these areas when we get the opportunity these areas are extremely susceptible to winter dessication as they will just die a slow death and will not green up in the spring. We had a little bit of this on #9 green last winter so we are trying to be proactive this year and stay in front of it to try and prevent any damage from occurring. This is why we try and leave our irrigation system charged as long as possible. Also this week we finished the cleanup on the hill between #1 and #18. Juan and the guys did an outstanding job and it looks really good. I have attached a picture below. We will hopefully start burning the brush piles as soon as we get a burn permit from the fire department next week. Speaking of permits we are still waiting to receive final approval from the State of Kansas to start the project on #5. We got word this week that a few more agencies need to look at our proposed work and give us their stamp of approval. We will get started once we get the word from the State. Yesterday we had the fun job of installing a plaque on #11 tee recognizing the tremendous generosity and dedication to Wolf Creek of Mr. Jack Stockdale for the great work he did on #11 creek last winter. I have attached a picture of the plaque below and hope that if you see him around that you will thank him again for his work! Well I hope each of you have a wonderful Thanksgiving with family and friends. I am very thankful this holiday season that I get to work at such a great place for such great members as yourselves. Thank you again for your support and for being the membership that you are! Wolf Creek is truly a special place! Have a great weekend!

Fridgid Weather Conditions and Golf Course Update

"Ole' Man" winter has made his presence known this year in a big way over the last week. Temperatures have been extremely cold for this time of year with highs in the teens and low 20s and lows dipping down to single digits. Needless to say things have slowed down a bit around the golf course over the past week. Before the extreme cold hit we were able to get half of the drainage project done on the short end of #14 fairway. We hope that once temperatures warm up a bit later this week that we will be able to get back out and continue working. Tree work has continued and Juan and his guys have done an outstanding job of getting dead trees that died during the year knocked down and have started doing some more clean up on the slope in between #1 and #18. We will continue working on these areas and removing dead trees throughout the winter as the weather permits. Earlier this week we finally received the permit from the CORE to allow us to do #5 project. However they told us that we had to notify the Kansas Department of Agriculture and get their permission before we could start. We are currently getting the paper work completed and will hopefully receive their blessing in the very near future. The feedback we have gotten from them is once they receive our paper work that things should move along quickly. So stat tuned as we are getting closer to starting the work. Have a great week and stay warm. It looks like Friday and Saturday will be warmer and will hopefully allow for some golf to be played. There are some much needed rain chances in there as the golf course has gotten very dry with the winds over the past week or so, but otherwise the weather looks favorable for golf.

Cold Front Arrives

In the matter of a day our high temperatures went from 70 degrees down to our high today of 33 degrees. Wow what a change in just 24 hours. I guess that is why they call this the Transition zone and why it is such a unique area to try and grow turf. Despite the cold temperatures the maintenance team was out and about working on some winter time projects. We are continuing to remove the trees around the golf course that didn't make through the season. A lot of these trees continue to be Black Locust trees that have either lived their short life or got hit hard during the summer drought a year ago. Today we were working on the trees along #6 tees and in between #6 and #7. Also we finally started our drainage project on the short end of #14 fairway. Our goal is to get this done as soon as possible before the winter moisture arrives and makes this area a sloppy wet mess. As I said last week the drainage in this area is going to make a big difference next year and help us to have good consistent turf coverage and firmer conditions in this fairway. I have attached a picture of the drainage trenches prior to us installing the pipe and gravel. It looks like the rest of the week is going to be very cold and winter like with maybe a chance of snow later in the week. We still are waiting on the arrival of the permit to start on the #5 project. Hopefully we will see it sometime this week. Keeping our fingers crossed. I hope everyone stays warm and has a great week.

Tree Work

This week has been a great week for us here at Wolf Creek. The weather has been decent and the maintenance team has been extremely busy with some projects. Tree work has been a big focus of ours this week as we started to do some thinning out and cleaning out of the tree area in between holes #4 and #8. I have posted a few photos below of a before and after shot. As you can see there was a lot of over growth removed and it really cleaned this area up a lot. Our goal is to try and keep this somewhat maintained and not let all the ragweed and other weeds take it over so that it has a cleaner appearance. Also we have continued to focus on the leaf clean up and mulching around the golf course. I feel like the leaves are starting to really slow down as of late and that we have gotten most of them mulched or blown for this first round. We will have another round later in the fall as all the Oaks will start to drop their leaves, but it is no where as extensive as it was this first go around. Also we marked the drainage project on the short end of #14 that we hope to start early next week once the ground freezes a bit. Out of all the projects this winter besides #5 I think the drainage installation on #14 will have the biggest benefit as this area has been an issue for as long as I can remember. Today we are out mowing the greens and changing the cups in front of this next big winter air mass that is on it's way next week. Like I mentioned last week we are down to only mowing the greens twice a week now due to their lack of growth and will probably be down to once a week on the roughs as this cold front approaches. We are still waiting on the permits to come in to start the #5 project. Our anticipation after some feedback we had with the CORE is that we might see something next week sometime. I will keep everyone up to date as to whether we get it next week or not. I hope everyone has a great weekend! Big game for my KSU Wildcats this weekend so GO CATS!

Winning Continues Along with The Colder Temperatures

Congratulations our professional members Tom Pernice Jr. on his win at the Charles Schwab Championship in Scottsdale over the weekend and Gary Woodland's second place finish in Malaysia at the CIMB Classic on the Asian Tour! Wolf Creek has had some kind of run as of late with Robert Streb's win last weekend and then to follow up the next week with a first and second is outstanding! Weather conditions here in KC over the last week or so have really slowed down the growth rate of the turf. We are starting to slow down our mowing practices to at least every other day on the greens and just once a week on the roughs. However we will continue to mulch and blow leaves as needed. Also this week we have started removing the dead trees around the golf course that we marked a few weeks ago. This will be an ongoing project over the winter. Our plan is to hopefully start a drainage project on the short end of #14 fairway this week or next depending on the weather. We are delayed to start today after the .2" of rain that received overnight. As you know this area doesn't take much to be wet so we will try and catch it before it get's too wet and get the drainage installed. Getting this area done will drastically help this area be more playable, allow for carts to travel on it, and help the turf be more consistent and healthy. Once we start I will upload some pictures showing our progress. The project on #5 is still in the holding pattern as we are still waiting on the permits to be returned to us. I will continue to monitor the situation as Jack Stockdale and myself are eagerly awaiting the arrival of the permits any day in our mail. I hope everyone is having a great week!

Winning Ways and Mulching Leaves

It is a beautiful time of year here at Wolf Creek. The trees are changing colors, the zoysia is going dormant, and the cool season roughs are as green as they get all year. With all these changes comes a lot of mulching of the leaves,picking up hedge balls and acorns, and blowing leaves out of bunkers and cart paths that fall from all the trees around the golf course. We have been extremely busy trying to keep up with what is falling naturally and what the wind has been blowing down also. It looks like over the next week or so we will be getting back into some frosty mornings. If you are planning to play early I appreciate your patients when we do have frost delays as we will try to get you out on the golf course as soon as possible. Also I posted a little video a few weeks ago on the blog detailing why frost delays happen and why we are so diligent about making sure it is gone first before play starts. If you would like to look at that video again you can look in the archives of the blog over on the right side tool bar. Today we are doing some sodding on #6 collar to convert it from the Penn Links bentgrass that it currently is to A4 bentgrass. I have attached some photos below of the crew laying the new sod into place. We only have a few more holes left to do before we have all the collars on the golf course converted to a much more wear and heat tolerant turf. This will probably be the last collar this year, but our plan is to convert the remaining holes next fall. Yesterday morning we applied a thin layer of topdressing on the greens and pin spiked them to help keep the surface area open to allow for water and oxygen to get into the root-zone. With the rolling and mowing practices that we use this is a necessary practice to help keep our greens in top form. A lot of members have been asking when we are going to be starting on redoing the wall on #5. We are currently waiting on approval and permitting from the Core of Engineers. Once we get the approval it should be a matter of time before we start. I will keep everyone informed as the process moves forward. Have a great week and hopefully the Royals can duplicate 1985 and make a comeback from down 3-2 in the series and bring home the World Series!! Also a huge Congratulations to our own Robert Streb on winning his first of many PGA Tour events as he won in a dramatic three man playoff over the weekend at the McGladrey Classic! It couldn't have happened to a better guy Congrats Robert!!

Perfect Weather and World Series

Our recent weather conditions over the past week have been picture perfect! We have been having high temperatures in the mid to upper 70s all week and lows in the mid 40s, which has resulted in a lot of sunshine, minimal clouds,and hardly any wind. It couldn't of happened at a better time for us as we were able to provide great course conditions for the KCGA Kansas City Masters tournament, that was held on Monday and Tuesday. Congratulations to our own Mark Terranova on winning the event! Mark played some outstanding golf this week and closed it out in style birding three holes on the back nine coming down the stretch. I have attached a picture of Mark below with the winning trophy. This past week the maintenance team was able to get all the overseeding done on the golf course after the rains and wet conditions we have had recently preventing us from finishing. We still lack a little bit more to do on our Driving Range and are hoping we will get this done in the next day or two as time is running out to get the seed to germinate before the temperature and frost start setting in regularly. Also all the edging of the bunkers was completed, giving the bunkers a much cleaner and well maintained look. The dry weather conditions have allowed us to finally get caught up on the mowing in the roughs and green banks eliminating the clumps of grass clippings that were around from mowing after the rains last week and the leaves that are starting to fall from the trees. Speaking of trees it is absolutely beautiful out here at the course as all the Fall colors are in full effect. If you haven't been out here you need to soon before all the leaves fall. Our plan this week is to finish up all overseeding and spot sodding in the roughs. Also we are going to be doing some more collar conversions on a few holes, continuing our three year plan of converting all of our greens collars from Penn Links bentgrass to A4 bentgrass. The holes we are looking to do this week are #4,6,& possibly 8. We are doing this to make our greens complexes consistent, but also we feel the A4 is more traffic tolerant and holds up better under the summer stresses. Well we have waited 29 years for the Royals to make the Postseason and man have they been fun to watch this season. Game 1 of the World Series last night didn't go as planned for them, but I am confident they will get it turned around tonight! This town has been on fire this past week or so and it has been a lot of fun to see. Go Royals!!!

Wet Conditions Continue

What is the old saying "When it rains it pours"? Well that is exactly what has been happening here in KC over the past couple of days. We have been getting hammered with a lot of rain. Yesterday's 2" rain brought us up to roughly 8" of rain over the last 8 days or so. Needless to say course conditions are very wet and the rough is tall and thick. The crew has been out this morning getting the cart paths cleaned up from all the debris and are working on getting the bunkers repaired. A positive out of yesterday's storm is that the rain was at a nice steady pace and wasn't a down pour so our bunkers didn't sustain much damage. However there are still a few holding water until the creek goes down and the drainage can let the water out. Also today we are continuing on edging of the bunkers to give them that nice clean and crisp look going into the winter. I have attached a picture below showing how we do the edging. We hope to have some mowers out in some isolated areas maybe later today after this wind blows a bit and helps do some drying out. It will probably be at least tomorrow before we can even think about mowing any rough. I hope everyone has another great week! Go ROYALS!!

Soggy and Wet Course Update

Wet soggy conditions have continued over the past two days as we have been having a lot of rainfall. Over the last two weeks we have now received over 6" of rain. Today alone we have received about 2.25". Needless to say the course conditions are pretty wet and damp. Today's rain has been a steady rain so the bunkers aren't as bad as they were last week when it took us three days to repair them. We hope to have them repaired this weekend if the rains slow down. Today we were able to get out and do some blowing and get all the debris that blew down picked up. Also we kept working on edging of the bunkers and started to repair the washed out bunkers once the rain started to slow down this morning. I hope everyone has a great weekend. Hopefully the Royals will be able to play their game tonight, but I think it is going to be very tough with all the rain that is headed towards Baltimore.

Perfect Weather Week

The weather over the past week or so has been about as perfect as you can ask for. High temperatures have been in the mid 70's and the lows have been in the high 30's to low 40's. We have had a few frosty mornings over the past week or so which has caused a few morning delays. I appreciate everyone's patience this time of the year during these delays. We have a unique property with the elevation differences and unfortunately #1,2,3,11,& 12 are some of the slowest holes to burn frost off of due to the shade and proximity to the creek. I have attached an informational video on frost and the damage that can be caused by it if golfers walk on it. Since my last blog post last week we have been busy cleaning up after the big 3.75" rain last weekend and getting our bunkers back into shape. Also we were able to get all the rough aerification completed on the entire golf course prior to the rain which was huge. However we still have to do some spot seeding in the roughs on holes #15-18 and the driving range once the parts for our seeder arrive and we can get it repaired after breaking down late last week. Hopefully in the next couple of days we will start to see some good seed germination in the areas we over seeded. I am just starting to see a few little seedlings start to come up so over the next few days we should start to see it. The animal damage caused from the racoons and skunks has slowed a bit over the last week or so. Hopefully this continues and we are staying in front of it a bit and beating them to the spots of grubs and earthworms and getting them treated before they have a chance to dig. However there are still a few isolated areas each day that we will continue to treat and repair as needed. Have a great week!

Fall Weather and Rain

It has been a while since I have posted here on the blog. I have been out of town attending an education seminar that I was selected to attend in Clayton, North Carolina last week and then have been extremely busy getting caught up here since I finally got home on Saturday afternoon after all of the flight cancellations on Friday. Our weather over the last week or so has been perfect! Highs in the 80s and lows in the 60s. The maintenance team has been taking advantage of it and have been extremely busy. Our fall aeration program in the roughs has almost been completed as we completed the golf course this morning. All that we have left is the driving range area. I appreciate everyone's patience during this process. I know it makes things a little messy for a few days but it is an extremely important agronomic practice to keep our roughs in top shape. Also we are working on doing our overseeding in a few areas. The amount of overseeding is substantially less then in years past, but we still have some thin areas where our heads don't hit consistently or there has been some animal damage that need to be addressed. We continue to battle the animal damage in the roughs. It has been a battle that I feel we have had pretty good luck with so far this year with our diligence of checking everyday and treating the grub areas before the animals find them and do the digging. We will have to stay on this plan until the frost start happening and the grubs will eventually move down into the soil where the animals can't get them. On Monday we did another light topdressing on the greens to help them continue to stay firm, fast, and smooth. They are in great shape right now as they usually are in the fall and should continue to improve. The zoysia fairways and tees have really slowed down their growth over the past week with the cooler temperatures and shorter days. Like I have talked about in previous blog post I am going to stop mowing and let them grow some leaf tissue to help protect them through the winter months so my plan right now is to stop mowing the fairways unless we get a drastic change in out weather pattern. There is a possibility that we could still mow the tees another time or two since they don't take any cart traffic like the fairways do. I have attached a few photos of the rough aerifier, the plugs after the aerifier goes through, and the overseeder to show the equipment that we use. Have a great week and man what a game last night!!!!

Fall is Here

I am sorry for not posting anything over the last week or so. I have been extremely busy with tournament preparations for our annual "Friends/Foes" event, and I was out of town at a conference for a few days as well. The weather has been extremely good over the last week. We received about 2.5" of rainfall early last week that came in a short amount of time causing some bunker damage. However it was extremely beneficial to the rest of the golf course as things were getting a bit dry. Also we have been busy chasing the animal damage that occurs every year around this time. The skunks, raccoons, and opossums come out looking for grubs, doing serious damage by digging up the turf scavenging for the grubs. Our line of defense is to try and beat them to the spots and get the grubs treated before they start the digging. However this is extremely tough to get every spot all the time and some nights the animals will find more hot spots then others. We do apply a preventative treatment for grubs during the season but you still get some isolated spots were the chemical didn't get watered down into the ground well enough because that area was hydrophobic or repelled the water. If we find some grubs we treat the areas with an insecticide provided by the chemical company that kills the grubs on contact. Depending on the severity of the digging most of these areas will recover. However there will be some areas that get dug up enough that we will either seed them or sod them to do the repair. It is a long and hard fight but we do it every year and will continue to battle. Today we are starting the aerification process in the roughs around some of the tees and bunker areas. We will move to the green bank areas and the rough after our Wolf Day on Tuesday. Also this week we will began some spot seeding in various thin areas around the golf course as well. Starting this week we will be backing off the mowing of the zoysia fairways and tees to once a week as they have really slowed down. We will probably only mow them one or two more times before we start letting them get some growth to help protect them through the winter months. Have a great week and congratulations to Mike Garozzo and Shorty McKenney on winning the "Friends/Foes" event over the weekend!!!

Cold Front Is Here

Burrrr has been a very popular word used today as temperatures have plummeted to highs in the 50s and lows into the 40s. This is very unusual weather this early in the year. A lot of people have asked me if this is good for the golf course or not. This weather is unbelievably good for our cool season roughs and the greens as they recover after the aeration. Not so much for the zoysia grass however. The zoysia has really started losing it's color and has slowed down growing this week as a result of the weather change. We are going to back off our mowing frequency over the next week or so as the grass slows down. Our plan this year is to stop mowing the zoysia a little earlier in the year to help it grow some leaf tissue to help protect it more over the winter months and try to minimize any winter damage. I will give more details on this once we get closer to not mowing anymore. Also this week we removed some of the native grass on the right side of #10 fairway and installed some new fescue sod. Our hope is that this change makes this hole a bit easier for everyone to find their tee shot when it goes on the right side. I have attached a picture below of the new sod. I hope everyone finds this change to be very beneficial. The greens are continuing to recover nicely after the aeration. We repaired some collar areas on the greens this week where the turf was a little weak and then once we aerified it was going to have a hard time recovering. Next week we will busy getting ready for the annual "Friends and Foes" tournament. My staff and I are looking forward to the event as it is one of our favorites to get ready for. Have a great weekend!

Greens are Healing

The weather and temperatures have been cooperating very well lately. Greens are continuing to heal and are doing it rather quickly. I took a picture this morning and have attached it below. You can tell they have filled in quite a bit since we aerified them last week. We applied a thin coat of topdressing sand yesterday afternoon to help fill up any voids in the greens that were present after the sand has settled in the holes from our recent rains and from our irrigation cycles. Our plan is to apply one maybe two more thin topdressing leading up to the "Freinds and Foes" event next weekend. We are currently mowing the greens with a ride on triplex mower at a little taller height then we normally mow our greens. Thus causing the greens to be a little slower. This is done to help the plants recover quicker, but also to protect our walk behind greens mowers from all the sand. As you can imagine sand will grind on the blades pretty good and cause some major dulling issues. So to help with this we utilize a riding mower for a couple of times until the sand is mostly worked into the greens profile and the holes are for the most part filled in. Hopefully be the end of the week we will be back to mowing with our walk behinds. I hope everyone is enjoying the week I will update you later in the week on the progress on the greens and our sodding project on the right side of #10.

Friday Course Update

Our weather pattern is changing and it looks like the nice Fall temperatures and humidity are on their way here to Kansas City. These lower temperatures will really help the greens continue to recover nicely after the aeration and will benefit the course nicely as we get ready to start our fall rough aeration and spot seeding. The greens aeration went very well all things considered. We got slowed down a bit waiting on the sand to dry after the rain, but I am not going to complain too much as the temperatures and wind were very manageable. Any rain is good rain right now. I really appreciate everyone's patience as I know aeration is a disruptive practice to our greens. However the benefit that we get from doing it is so much better then the alternative. I look at it as a short term pain for a long term gain! The heavy duty greens roller has been out on the greens the past couple of days continuing to try and smooth out all the ruts and footprints from the aeration. Recovery time after aeration usually takes about two weeks. I have attached a picture below showing us rolling the greens this morning and what the greens look like today. I have mentioned in past blog post of how much the zoysia has been loving these warm and humid days. I took a picture this morning of us mowing the fairways and another somewhat close up of our zoysia to show how good it is doing right now. The zoysia looks the best right now that it has looked all season in my mind with the color and thickness. Have a great weekend!!!

Aeration Day Is Here

It is finally here and despite the 2.5" of rain that we have received over the past two days we are still able to start the aerification process on the greens. The wet conditions may slow us up a bit as we are going to have to let the plugs and sand dry out quite a bit before we can pick them up and before we can start to broom the sand into the aerification holes on the greens. This may cause the process to be extended a bit, but hopefully all goes well and we can get most of them completed today. If we don't get completely done today we will finish them in front of any play tomorrow. I will post some photos of us aerifying once the sun comes up and I have some light so the picture shows up. Have a great day!!

Big Weekend and Aerification Preparation

The hot and steamy weather has continued this week, however as I am typing this it looks like the temperatures are starting to cool off and we might actually have some rain moving into our area. Hopefully I didn't jinx it because we could really use a nice rain as I have been begging for some the past couple of weeks. We have had a very busy week here at the club and we are going to have another busy week next week. Our day yesterday was very busy as we did our final preparations for the annual Member/Pro/Guest event that was held yesterday. I was very proud of my staff as I feel they presented a very good golf course for all of the competitors. It has been a true testament to the dedication of my staff as they have been working their tails off to keep the golf course in great condition during this hot stretch of weather. Our zoysia continues to love the heat and humid conditions and the greens and rough are doing as well as expected considering the tough growing conditions that we have had over the past couple of weeks. Today we are finishing up some mowing and last minute detail items in preparation for the busy holiday weekend that is ahead. It looks like the weather is going to be great and the golf course conditions will hopefully be the same. Also we are doing some last minute preparations for our greens aerification which starts next Tuesday. Our plan is to use a combination of 1/2" and 5/8" coring tines on our greens. These are the same tines we used this spring and last year. I have attached a picture below showing the tines loaded into the aerifier. I also attached a picture of one of our sand bins full of sand and ready to go to fill the holes in one the greens. We will use roughly 75 tons of sand during our aerification. Recovery time will be roughly 10 to 14 days and the greens should be back close to 100%. The greens are ready to get some much needed oxygen down to the roots and get some fresh sand to continue to firm them up even more. I hope you have a safe and great holiday weekend and I hope to see you all on the golf course as well!

Hot Temperatures Continue

The heat and humidity have continued over the past several days with highs in the upper 90s and lows in the mid to upper 70s. Along with the temperatures the humidity levels have been extremely high which has made it rather unpleasant and uncomfortable. The golf course has continued to hold up very well despite the hot and humid weather. Greens have softened up a bit from the humidity and the hand watering that is required, but all in all I feel they have stayed relatively firm through this weather. All of our greens are at that point in the year where they are ready to be aerified and opened up to allow that much needed oxygen to get down into the soil profile. We try to supplement this through out the season with the solid tine and venting practices we do, but nothing we do can simulate core aerification. A lot of times it seems like once we aerify the greens it is like hitting the reset button for the year as they firm up and take a breath of fresh oxygen. Speaking of aerification just a reminder that we will be aerifying our greens on Tuesday September 2nd. This week we are also continuing to do some spot sodding of a few more zoysia areas in the fairways and maybe a few of the damaged bunker faces. We need to try and have as much sodding done in the next week or so to allow the sod to knit down and root in before the fall frost arrive. Also this week we are starting our preparation on the course for the annual Member/Pro/Guest event on Thursday trying to get everything mowed out and trimmed up. It looks like the weather is going to cool down a bit on Thursday which will be a welcome site and make it a more pleasurable event. Our next chance of rain is scheduled for sometime on Friday and Saturday which would be a huge help after this hot stretch. I hope everyone has a great week and is ready for College Football to start on Thursday like I am! This is my favorite time of the year!!

Heat Wave

Looks like this week we are in store for a little bit of summer over the next four days. Highs are forecast to be in the mid to upper 90's through the weekend. Instead of being on the offense like we have been able to be all summer with verticutting, topdressing, rolling, etc. we will have to be a little defensive this week with our greens management. Our rolling practices will be less and we will have to be watering a few times more on the greens by hand during the day. So if you come across my guys as they are cooling a green I would appreciate you giving them the time to finish up quickly and get out of your way. They should only need a few minutes to cool the greens down. Another practice we use is utilizing our portable Sub-Air units and back pack blowers to blow air into the drain lines of the greens. This helps the root zone of the greens to cool down as the air coming out of the drain lines is 60 degrees and it also helps give the roots of the plants some much needed oxygen to help them survive during the hot and humid days. I have attached a picture below of a back pack blower installed on one of our greens. We use plumber caps to block off the drain lines forcing the air up into the green profile. It is a very beneficial practice and one that we have been using over the past couple of years. Also this week we are going to continue doing some sod work on the short end of #14 fairway. I know this area got hit hard by our winter this year due to how much moisture this areas tends to hold from the clay soil that is underneath. Our plan this winter is to install some drain lines in this area to hopefully eliminate some of these issues. I hope everyone has a great week and stay cool as the summer weather is on it's way!!!

Amazing Weather Continues

Our amazing weather pattern has continued to provide us some awesome weather over the past week or so. High temperatures have been in the low 80's to high 70's and the lows have been all the way down into the 50's like they were this morning. I don't think I have ever worn a jacket in August until I did this morning. I will gladly do that every year if need be!! The golf course has dried out nicely over the last two days after we received another very beneficial 1.75" of rain on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon. That puts our total last week to around 3.5" of rainfall for the week. Over the last two days we have been venting our greens to help dry out the surface and will be applying a thin coat of topdressing sand on Wednesday to help keep them smooth and firm. Hopefully the zoysia sod farm will dry out today so that we can continue to do some patch sodding of some zoysia areas. We are starting to get down to the end of our sodding window as the weather will start to change causing the growth of the zoysia to slow down drastically. However we still have a couple of good weeks of time and we will try to maximize it. Another item this week that we are hopefully going to get marked off our to do list is to repair the rain shelter on #12 green. This shelter has been leaning for a long time and we are going to install some new post and hopefully stabilize the structure and make it's appearance more pleasant. Lastly I wanted to drop a quick reminder that our fall aerification of the greens is coming up quickly and our day for that is Tuesday September 2nd. The golf course will be closed that day as we will try and get all 18 greens completed. Have a great week and get out and enjoy this dynamite weather!!!

Good Heavy Rain

I have been asking for a nice heavy rain and we finally got one last night. We received 1.75" of rainfall accompanied with some high winds. The golf course however held up pretty well. Bunkers took a hit and so did a few limbs on some of our trees but all in all everything else withstood the storm pretty well. The staff is currently out mowing greens, repairing bunkers, and doing some limb cleanup. Carts will be on paths today as the fairways are very wet. However I do think with the dry conditions leading into this rain that things will dry out fairly quickly for the weekend. This week has been another fantastic week here in the maintenance department. We had a few hot summer days but the golf course really held up well. The little shot of rain we received on Sunday was very beneficial to the course and helped us get through those hot days a lot easier. Our fairways have really come around over the last week or so. It has been a long slow summer for the Zoysia grass but they are finally catching their stride I feel. Patching in the fairways has continued this week as we were able to do some more on #6 and #8. We spent the first part of the week checking the sand depths in our bunkers and moving the sand around to make our depths more uniform and consistent. However when you get rains like we did last night it makes the process of putting them back in shape a lot harder because they are washed out in places and we have to spend a lot of time fixing them. It looks like the extended forecast looks pretty good over the next 5 days or so as high temperatures are supposed to stay in the upper 80s which isn't too bad for this time of the year. Just a reminder that our fall aerification is scheduled for Tuesday September 2nd. I hope you all have a great week.

Busy Monday

We finally received some much needed rain over the weekend as we had .75" on Sunday. The rain came at a very good time as things were getting rather dry around here. Due to the dry conditions before the rain carts are off the paths today as the moisture soaked into the soil rather quickly. After a thunderstorm like that things really perk up and look good and makes you realize just how good water from "Mother Nature" is compared to our irrigation water. Today we have had an extremely busy day. We spiked, fertilized, and sprayed our greens with a fungicide and plant nutrient product. The spiking will help work some oxygen down to the roots and help the surface of the greens dry out some so it doesn't sit in wet conditions with temperatures increasing. It looks like for at least the next couple of days we are going to once again get some summer time temperatures with highs in the mid 90s. We are currently mowing rough, tees, greens, green banks, and doing some weed eating around trees today in hopes of getting the course mowed out before the hot temperatures hit this afternoon and tomorrow. Our plan this week is to continue working on some fairway areas and installing some sod, checking sand depths in our bunkers as the sand has moved around a bit and our depths are inconsistent, and finishing up spraying clover/nutsedge in our roughs and fairways. Have a great week and I will update everyone on our progress later in the week.

Great Weather Continues

Our summer weather continues to be outstanding as the forecast this week is looking more like spring then summer. Highs are suppose to stay in the mid to lower 80's and lows are supposed to get down into the mid 60's. This is very unusual for this time of year as I know you are all aware, but I can't remember another summer like it! Course conditions are very good right now as the turfgrass is really enjoying the cooler weather pattern. However we really could use some help from "Mother Nature" to give us a little rainfall. Areas that don't have good irrigation coverage are starting to show some drought stress from the lack of rainfall. It has been about 3 weeks or so since we have had any substantial rainfall here and the soil is starting to really dry out. Here in the turf care department we have continued to stay really busy over the last week. Sodding in the fairways and a few rough areas has continued. This has been a long process this year as the winter weather caused some more then normal turf loss, but we are making some good progress and everything we have already replaced seems to be doing great and establishing nicely. On Monday we verticutt and topdressed the greens continuing our maintenance practices to continue to have good smooth and firm putting surfaces. Another focus of ours this week is doing some spraying of some nutsedge and clover that has emerged in our roughs over the last month with the nice cool weather. This cooler weather is allowing us to shift our focus some and get a lot of little projects like spraying weeds, edging bunkers, and sand depth work in some bunkers done due to us not having to babysit the greens like we do when it is hot. I hope all of you are having a great week and are able to get out and enjoy this spring like weather!!

First Real Heat Wave

It looks like we are finally going to have a summer heat wave over the next couple of days. Forecasted highs are supposed to be in the upper 90's with humidity levels extremely high as well causing the heat indexes to be in the 105-110 degree range. I guess it had to come at some point right? I mean it is the end of July! Our schedule this week has changed somewhat. We are using today as our off day on the greens and are currently out venting them prior to this heat wave to help them get the oxygen and water that they need to survive. We are not mowing them today. Also we are going to begin our fairway aerification process as soon as we get our tractor repaired this morning so it can pull the aerator. Our sweeper showed up on Friday but now our tractor is not wanting to run properly. The way things usually go is as soon as you need the piece of equipment the most it doesn't want to work! So we are delayed in getting the fairways started but hopefully we will be able too soon. The staff are doing their other normal mowing of the fairways, tees, rough, and banks as well this morning. I will update the blog with some photos once we get going on the fairway process, which I am crossing my fingers and hoping it is very soon!!

Sweeping the plugs up!!

Fantastic Weather Once Again

The weather around Kansas City continues to be unbelievably good. Again this week we set new lows for the month of July which has been terrific so far. Cooler temperatures allow the turf to exhale a little bit and relax and enjoy itself as it continues to grow. The staff has been busy working on various projects around the course this week enjoying this great weather as well. On Monday we did another verticutt and topdressing on the greens to continue to firm the surface and keep the greens nice and smooth. Doing this practice continues to help dilute the thatch layer in the top of the plants and helps to smooth the surface by breaking up the grain and cutting the leaf tissue that is left behind by the mowers when we mow. Also we are installing another senior tee on #16 and are harvesting the fescue/bluegrass sod in this area to repair some thin areas in some of our low lying areas around some drainage areas that had thinned out from all the moisture. We usually don't do any fescue/bluegrass sodding in July but that goes to show just what kind of a weather year we have really had. I am still waiting on the demo sweeper to show up so that we can start the aerification in the fairways. I am still hoping for it to show up this week so that we can get started. However we were able to get all the tee boxes aerified this week and this has really helped them take off and grow even more then they already were by helping them get oxygen and moisture down into the root zoned more efficiently and breaking up the compaction. Like I have mentioned before we still have a few areas in a couple of the fairways and a few other spots here and there that we are going to be sodding with zoysia once we get a few of these other projects completed. I also attached a picture below of the root growth we have had on our greens this year. I know a lot of it has to do with the weather we have been having, but I also know that our agronomic practices we have been doing over the last four years is really starting to pay off and we are now developing a very strong root system in our greens. This plug was taken on the fourth of July and I have never seen the roots that deep this late in the summer before.

Nice Weather Continues

Our weather pattern continues to impress here in the KC area. This past week has been no exception with high temperatures in the mid 80s and lows in the 60s. It looks like we are in store for a few warm days this weekend with temperatures in the mid to upper 90s but then according to the long range forecast it looks like things are really going to cool down next week back into the 70s for highs and 50s for lows. Temperatures and the timely rains have been a big help this summer so far. However I know we still have the rest of July to go and the month of August so things could still change in a hurry. We have had another great week here in the turf care department. Sodding of the Zoysia grass has continued as we are getting closer and closer to being done and getting all the winter kill areas repaired. This week we are going to finish sodding #9 fairway area and have done a few spots around some of our practice greens and bunkers. We are still going to work on #10, 8, and maybe a bit more around the practice area. Our big project this week has been starting to apply our grub control for the year. This process takes a long time as we spray the entire golf course. I have had to apply a good amount of water to the holes we spray to help water the product into the soil profile enough to get down where the grubs reside. So this is the reason some of the holes have been a bit damp during the day. Also we applied our summer fertilizer application in our roughs as well. This helps the rough continue to grow and stay in good health all summer. With the cooler weather coming next week we are going to try and do some more cool season (fesuce/bluegrass) sodding on some areas on the short end of #14 and the low area in front of the fairway on #16. Also we are planning to install another senior tee on #16 as well. Have a great weekend!!!

Another Round of Rain

We continue to keep getting blessed with some very timely and beneficial rains here in the Kansas City area. Just as we were starting to dry out a bit and the grass was starting to show some drought stress over the weekend, we received another 1" of rain overnight. Along with the rain we also had some extremely high winds that caused some tree damage and knocked a lot of loose limbs and debris down. As you can imagine the course conditions today a pretty wet thus the carts are on the paths. We are busy working on repairing bunker washouts and raking them, picking up all the limbs and debris from the winds, and doing some selective mowing on some of our high drier green bank areas. Yesterday we were able to start the aerification process on some of our tees. It went well and we were able to get roughly six holes completed. Our plan is to try and get the aerifier back out later this afternoon and continue to work on some more tees on the back nine if conditions are dry enough. The good thing is a lot of our tees are mostly sand so they tend to dry out a little faster then the roughs and fairways that sit on heavier soils. I will try and get a photo later today if we continue the aerification of the tees to show you how we are doing it. I hope to see the sweeper show up here on sight this week so that we can start the fairway aerification process as soon as possible. I hope all of you had a great Fourth of July holiday with your friends and families and I will hopefully update the blog again later today with some photos.

Fourth of July Weekend

Wow what a treat we have had the last couple of days! Lows in the 50's and highs in the 70's! Who would of thought we would be saying that on July 3rd? We will surely take it and enjoy every minute of it because as many of you know it can change in a heart beat and be the exact opposite. The maintenance staff has had a great week so far here at the course. Zoysia grass sodding has been a focal point for us this week as we are trying to finish up a lot of the areas that are left that haven't fully recovered yet. I feel really good about the areas we have replaced that they are going to be back to normal in no time. We still have an area on #9 fairway that we are going to attack and a few areas on some of our practice fairways and bunker faces that we plan to replace in the very near future. The aerification in the fairways and tees obviously didn't start this week so our plan is to start this next week after the holiday. This should take us most of the week to complete as we will try to do a few holes a day to not disrupt the play on the golf course too much. Also this week we installed another forward tee on hole #4. Hopefully this tee will help our older members and juniors to be able to play this hole better. Well that is about it for this post today I need to go check on a few things and enjoy this nice weather today I hope all of you do the same and each of you have a very nice and safe holiday weekend with your friends and families!!

Rain Continues

Our weather pattern of wet and cooler temperatures has continued over the last week. I feel very lucky to be having this weather leading into the month of July. The wet conditions cause a few headaches but getting rains like this at the first of July is a huge bonus. During the last week the maintenance team has continued to stay very busy. We are continuing to replace some zoysia areas in some of our fairways on the back nine that we haven't touched yet. We are getting down towards the end I hope and I think the fairways are starting to grow and recover nicely in the sodded spots we replaced and overall. However #8 and #9 are still a bit behind the others due to their locations and the growing environment with the shade caused by the trees and the winter damage that occured. Our plan this week is to apply another round of fertilizer to the fairways and tees to try and help push them along some more. Today we are busy verticutting and topdressing the greens to help keep them as firm and smooth as possible. Carts are off of most of the fairways today with the exception of few low areas. It looks like the forecast is showing another round of thunderstorms for tonight. We will keep our fingers crossed that we don't get a heavy rain as that would not be good going into the holiday weekend. The mowers are out today and all systems are a go here as we are working diligently to get as much of the golf course mowed before the rain moves in later this evening. We are still waiting on our demo sweeper to show up here to start aerifying tees and fairways. At this point we will probably move this process into next week and wait for the holiday weekend to pass so that we aren't disrupting the golf. Have a great week!

Week After The Timberwolf

The weather cooperated nicely and we were able to have a very successful and awesome 2014 Timberwolf event that saw some great golf action. Congratulations to Todd O'Neil and his guest for taking home the honors of becoming the 2014 Timberwolf Champions! It was a great week for the maintenance staff as well as they performed at an extremely high level and worked their tails off providing championship conditions for all the competitors. The golf course really held up well over the week. I was very pleased with how the greens performed and how the zoysia fairways and tees continued to recover from the winter damage. Last night we received about 1" of rain which has softened things up a bit. We are unable to mow fairways or tees today and carts will be on paths for the day. However we are still able to get out and vent the greens this morning with the solid tine to help break the surface tension and continue to provide oxygen to the root systems. We will work on the front nine greens today and then will complete the back nine greens tomorrow. This week we are going to be working on doing some more sodding in the fairways and around some of our low drainage areas along the run off areas. I am hoping to be able to install an additional senior tee on hole #6 and will use the cool season sod from this area to repair the drainage areas in the rough along the approach areas. Our plan moving forward is to start the aerification process of the fairways and tees sometime later this week or we may wait until after the 4th of July weekend depending on when I receive the fairway sweeper that we are demoing from John Deere to pick up the cores that we pull. This machine really makes the aerification process extremely efficient and very clean. I will keep everyone posted on when are going to start this process. Have a great week and I hope to see all of you at the club very soon!!

Finally Dry Conditions

Finally we are starting to get some wind and warmer weather to help dry out the course this week. This is a sticky situation as I am nervous to cheer on hot and windy conditions going into the month of July, because as we all know this can become the norm very quickly. However this year I am ready for a little drier weather to help us to finally get caught up on the mowing and to help us get rid of all the clippings. As I mentioned in the beginning course conditions have dried out and carts are finally off the paths today on almost all the holes except for #3 and 16. The maintenance staff have started our tournament preparations for the Timberwolf which starts on Thursday. We have been mowing roughs continually, mowing fairways and tees, and doing some push mowing of bunker faces and wet areas that the mowers can't get. Also today we are doing some more sodding on some thin areas on #8 fairway by the fairway bunkers in the landing zone. This area isn't going to recover and this is a high traffic area for carts and a landing spot for tee shots. Also this week we received a new member of our equipment family! Our new light weight roller for the greens showed up just in time for us to use for the Timberwolf. This piece of equipment will allow us to roll the greens and not cause as much damage to the green or the surrounding area around the green by decreasing the P.S.I per square inch that the roller effects and it weighs 250 lbs. less. I have attached a picture of the roller below. I am confident that this tool will help us to match the expectations of our membership on our greens. I hope you all have a great week and my staff and I are very excited for the the Timberwolf and to showcase the course to all the guest this week.

Wet Conditions

After receiving about 6" of rainfall in the last week and half things are pretty wet here at Wolf Creek. However the sun has been out all day today and it looks like Saturday is going to be a good day as well for some drying out. Carts are still going to be on paths today with hopes that we may be able to get off on a few fairways on Saturday depending on how they dry out today. We are selectively mowing some rough areas and green bank areas around the golf course today, which should help out with the playability of the rough. Unfortunately we aren't able to get out and mow fairways or tees today as they are still really wet and full of moisture. I am planning to try and mow them on Saturday unless they are still too wet then we will have to wait until Monday unless we get another shot of rain on Sunday. The crew has been able to do a little bit more sodding on some zoysia areas this week. The wet conditions has obviously slowed this process down. Hopefully we are going to be able to get some more done prior to next weeks Timberwolf to help with playability in some of these high traffic areas. Next week we will start gearing up and getting the golf course ready for the Member/Guest event which starts on Thursday. We are keeping our fingers crossed that "Mother Nature" cooperates with us and helps us out so that we can have a great event like we are set up to have. Have a great weekend and I hope to see you on the tee in the very near future!!

Rain Rain Rain

I guess the moral of the story is you better be careful what you ask for. All spring we have been asking for some much needed rain and "Mother Nature" has delivered over the past 24 hours or so. Since about 2pm Monday we have received about 2.75" so far and it is still raining and looks like it is going to continue for a while today. The rain has fallen at a pretty nice soft and steady pace which is really good to allow a lot of it to soak into the ground and recharge the subsurface of moisture instead of just pouring down and running off. This also helps to keep our creek in it's banks and not cause any major flooding. The creek is full but not out of it's banks at this time. We were able to get all the rough, fairways, tees, and most of the green banks and tee banks mowed on Monday prior to the rain. Also on Monday we installed some more zoysia sod in a few thin areas on #1 fairway that are in the landing zone for tee shots. Our plan is to continue patching a few areas before next weeks Timberwolf on holes #7, 5, 8, and 18 if the weather allows us to do so. Have a great week and I hope to see you out at the club at some point this week when the rain stops!!!

Wind and Rain

"Mother Nature" has continued her trend of giving us up and down weather patterns and along the way has provided some much needed rain. On Sunday night we received .6" of rain and then on Tuesday night we received another .55" of very beneficial rain. Carts will be on paths today for most of the day at least. We will check it later in the day to see if things have dried out. Along with the beneficial rain that Sunday night's storm brought it also had some high winds with it that caused some tree damage around the golf course. I have attached two photos of a big limb that blew out of the tree behind #9 green and then a photo of some other tree limbs that fell on #4 tees. We had several limbs on the ground along with a bunch of little debris all over the course on Monday morning. Also on Monday and Tuesday we did our monthly solid tine venting on the greens. This was perfect timing as the greens were starting to not take the water as good prior to us opening them up a bit with the venting. Being able to do it and to catch a rain like we had on Tuesday night was perfect timing. We are going to continue to work on sodding zoysia in some of the thin areas around #4 approach, #1 approach and fairway, and #5 green side bunker. The golf course continues to perform well and is playing very well right now. I am extremely pleased with the repairs we have made and the progress that the course has shown coming out of the tough winter.

Tournament Preparation

I hope everyone had a safe and very relaxing Memorial Day weekend! Here at Wolf Creek we were very active as the weather was good and had a great turnout of golfers over the weekend. As the temperatures continue to warm up so does the ground temperature. This is important to us as it triggers several things when it comes to managing turf. First off it should really get the Zoysia grass growing finally and hopefully we are done with anymore set backs of cooler weather that slows the growth down. I have started to see the fairways and tees really start to wake up. We applied our first round of summer fertilizer this week to try and help it to grow and recover. We waited until now due to the cool and damp weather you can breed a lot of zoysia patch by adding nitrogen so we are very cautious during the cool and damp times of the year. Also with the warmer soil temperatures comes the threat of disease on our cool season turf. So we have to be diligent with our water and fertilizer from now until the end of summer as the warmer/humid weather at night is a breeding ground for several different diseases. Starting today we have began our preparations for this weekends Wolf Creek Invitational. It looks like the weather is going to cooperate and we are going to have a great weekend of golf. On Tuesday morning we verticut the greens for the second time this year and applied another light topdressing. This will continue to help us keep the surface smooth and also insures that our turf on the greens stays tight allowing us to have good ball roll by eliminating the leaf tissue that was laid over and not getting mowed by the mower. The verticut also helps us to incorporate the topdressing sand better into the canopy of the turf where we want it to go. I attached another photo of the verticut lines on the greens prior to us topdressing them to show you what they looked like. Today we are doing some more patching in some thin zoysia areas on #3 and #5. I have continued to see recovery in some areas and feel that the warm weather and fertilizer will help these thinner areas recover. Enjoy the warm weather and sunshine over the next couple of days.

Holiday Weekend

It has been an outstanding week of weather and activity here at Wolf Creek. The weather has been warm and full of sunshine and the maintenance team has been running at full throttle all week. We are still hoping for some much needed rain as we have yet to receive any significant amount this week. Last night it looked like we got a little shower enough to wet the pavement but not enough to really do any good. There are chances for the rest of the weekend so we will have to wait and see. The maintenance team has been busy working on replacing some more winter kill areas in our fairways on hole #8 and #4. We are hoping that the rest of the areas that are still somewhat dormant on these fairways will continue to green up like they are and eventually recover. Our plan is to continue to monitor these and give them some more time in the sun and warmer weather before we make our final decision to sod them. Another item we have been working on this week is spraying the rag weed crop in our native areas. I don't know if I have ever seen a crop this thick before! We will continue to spray these areas as needed. The rough and fairway turf have continued to shoot their seed heads out causing the fairways to look purplish and the roughs a bit of a yellowish white appearance. I am hoping that they are both getting to the end of this stage and then will start to settle in and harden off for the rest of the season. The seed heads make it difficult to get a good cut on these areas. The greens are continuing to perform unbelievably well so far this year. We have had a few areas around the greens get a little warm and crispy but the greens themselves have been holding their moisture very well. Since they have been holding the moisture so well we have been able to back off on the hand watering somewhat which has helped to keep them a bit firmer. Our goal is to continue to be diligent with our water management helping them to stay on the firm side as much as possible. One thing I would like to ask all of your help with is fixing unrepaired ball marks. I have been noticing an abundance of unrepaired ball marks on our greens. I think this is due to the greens being firmer and the balls bouncing more and rolling to the back of the greens. Players are then not seeing the marks towards the front of the greens where the ball actually hit. I would like to get everyone's help with this and together we can remedy this issue. I have included a little video showing the proper way to repair a ball mark. It looks like the weather is going to be great over the holiday weekend and on Monday. Hopefully the rain will come at night time so the golfing will be uninterrupted and we can also get our beneficial rain. Have a great and safe holiday weekend and I hope to see you at some point this weekend on the course!!

First Taste of Summer

The sunshine continues to shine this week and temperatures are supposed to be in the upper 80's for a couple of days. This is going to give us our first taste of some summer weather when it comes to the temperatures. Along with the warm temps we have had some very windy conditions that have really started to dry some areas out. I am really hoping that the chances of rain this week come true and we get some much needed rain. However we are not nearly as bad off as some of our counterparts to our south and west so I know it can get much worse if it wants to. We have had a good start to the week as things have gone very well. Monday we topdressed the greens to continue to help keep them as smooth and firm as possible. The greens have been behaving extremely well so far this year. Our root development has been as good as I have seen in my time here. We are finding roots consistently at a 6.5" - 8" depth pretty consistently. I downloaded a picture of a 6.5" core that I took this morning and it shows a little white root hanging out the bottom. I actually broke them off on accident but they are at least 6.5" down and continued in the hole a ways more which is tremendous. Depending on if it decides to rain or not we might do another venting of the greens later this week to help us continue to promote the rooting and keep the oxygen and nutrients moving down to the roots. We are also continuing to do some patching of some winter kill areas in our fairways. Our latest one we sodded was #8 approach area. I have seen some nice recovery in a lot of the areas over the last week or so. The Frost from Friday - Sunday however will set them back another week or so from really growing, as it is hard for the zoysia plant to reverse it's growth habit from thinking it needed to go into dormancy with the frost to actively growing again with the warmer temperatures. We will continue to monitor these areas and repair them if needed. A good sign that the zoysia is starting to think about growing again is the fact that it started shooting it's ugly purple seed heads. This will go on for about 2 weeks and then it should stop so if you were wondering what the purple hue is in the fairways this is the reason. Enjoy the sun and have a good week!!

Cool Temps as Promised

The weather forecasters were right on the money this week with the forecast. Temperatures have been on the cool side like they predicted. This morning we had one of the hardest frost I have seen and temperatures were 29 degrees at 6am here at the golf course. The up and down temperatures shouldn't do a lot of damage to the turf with it only occurring today, however it doesn't help out our zoysia areas that we are trying to get to grow and finally come out of dormancy. Frosty mornings will set it back a bit but hopefully with next's weeks forecast high temperatures in the mid 80's they will start to grow again and continue to recover. This week we have been extremely busy prepping the golf course for the KGA Kanza Cup event and continuing to work on our sodding and routine maintenance practices around the course. We have had a great week of work and have gotten a lot mowed and repaired and I am feeling good about where we are going into the weekend. Over the last week or so the greens and roughs have started to slow down growing. The roughs is due to the fact that the bluegrass/fescue are starting to shoot their seed heads out and the weather conditions have been drier. The greens is also due to the weather but it is more to the growth regulator application that I mentioned last week. This product shuts down the vertical growth of the grass forcing the plant to concentrate it's efforts to developing a good and healthy root system. This also helps to keep the ball roll on the greens at a more consistent rate through out the day as well. The course has really come alive over the week and things are starting to get into their form for the year. Have a great weekend and hopefully you all are able to get out and enjoy the great weather and play some golf!