No Carts Today...4-25-13

We are sorry to report that no carts will be available today.  Mother Nature continues to keep the golf course saturated this spring but better news is on the horizon.  The 10 day forecast calls for an extended period of warmer weather (mid 60's to near 70) throughout most of the weekend and late into next week.  Finally, some good golfing weather is just around the corner!!!

No Carts....Again - 4-16-13

Mother Nature continues to be relentless with the rain.  The course was still soaked yesterday after the 3" inches of last week and now it's raining "cats and dogs" this morning.  We will be unable to run carts at all today and the rest of the week is not looking much brighter.  Thanks for your continued understanding and patience. 

Authored by: Bob McCurdy, Golf Course Superintendent

No Carts Sunday April 14th, 2013

There will be no golf carts available again on Sunday April 14th due to the extremely wet conditions that persist on the golf course. We need some sun and wind to dry out the course after the 3.1" of rain that was received between Wednesday and Friday.  Sorry for the inconvenience, but we must protect the course this early in the season. We will get the carts rolling as soon as we can. Thanks for your understanding and cooperation!!!

Course Closed 4-12-13

Attention Members:
COURSE CLOSED TODAY – Friday, April 12th, 2013

The course has received 3.1” of rain in the last 48 hours and therefore a decision has been made to close for today.  This closure includes all golf related areas (Championship Course, Short Course, Range, Chipping and Practice Greens).  Greens crews are out working aggressively to remove the water as quickly as possible in order for the course to re-open tomorrow.

Dainforth B. French, Jr.
Golf and Greens Chairperson

3" inches of Rain

Below are some photos of today's rain event.

Course Closure Communication

Below is a communication from club President, Steve Schafer, and Greens Chair, Clark Standish, regarding recent course closures.



August 9, 2011


Dear Fellow Members,

The Summer of 2011 will be remembered for some of the most extreme weather in recorded history. These records, dating to 1896, will show the July heat to be the highest recorded, while also being the third highest in rain precipitation. Obviously, this extreme weather has served as a threat to our newly-renovated golf course.

At Spring meetings to consider the course reopening, the Greens Committee/GCROC, in conjunction with Course Superintendent Bob McCurdy and the Board of Governors, set forth to address potential weather threats with but one mandate: to protect the golf course at all costs. The new turf in our greens and tees, along with the fairways and rough surrounds, is very immature and susceptible to a number of potentials for stress failure. We gave Bob a strong level of authority to act and protect the golf course in this opening season in hopes of maximizing the performance potentials for the turfgrass in the years to come.

Today, after a 1" rain which began in the middle of the night and let up around 8am, we were forced to close the golf course again. The drainage system which was installed in 2001 and 2002 is designed to clear roughly 1" of rain in 4-6 hours. Had last evening's rain occurred earlier we would have been able to get the course readied for play this morning. The drainage system is functioning effectively and maximally; the timing and severity of the downpours have done a lot of the dictating; our grounds crew has worked tirelessly in every instance to get the course cleared of standing water and readied for play.

We will continue to act in a conservative manner in protecting the new turf on our golf course through the current golf season. As the turf matures, the potential exists to allow play after such torrential rains as we have seen this summer.

Thank you for your patience and it is our hope to keep as much play out on the course as Mother Nature will allow!

Sincerely,


Stephen G. Schafer,
President, Board of Governors

J. Clark Standish
GCROC Chairperson

Course Closed 7-28

Mother Nature has once again shown her ugly side this morning. As of 6:00am this morning the course had already received 2 inches of rain overnight and it's pouring again as I type this. The facts being what they are, we have no choice but to close the golf course for the entire day today.

Greens Chair Update to the BOG and Greens Committee

Below is a correspondence from Clark Standish, Greens Chair, to the Board of Governors and Greens Committee


To all-
I am writing to provide some timely update on the status of the golf course, given the flooding from this week's rains...

I spoke with Bob McCurdy this morning and we are about as well off as we could have hoped for, given the events. The fairways are mostly free of standing water and the remaining puddles are being hit with squeegees by the crew. This is exhausting work and I am certain there are a lot of aching bodies out there at present.

There is still a lot of water in the area spanning from the woods on the left side of #11 fairway and all the way over into #7 fairway. The drains are clear and working but there is simply so much water in this area that we can't move it out fast enough. Bob is using pumps to displace as well.

Mother Nature is cooperating (fancy that!) for the meantime with cloudy and cool temperatures. Sun and heat today would be more problematic than current conditions. Forecast for tomorrow is 50% chance of storms- if we can dodge that, we will hopefully be ok.

The more water we can get off the course and out of standing areas, in fairways (priority) and rough, the better- before the high heat and heavy sun anticipated for the end of the weekend. The crew is mowing tees and greens and we will hope to get them out mowing the fairways tomorrow, weather permitting. The rough will be a different story...

The bunkers have held up beautifully. There is a lot of accumulation of silt on the sand surface owing to water washing in from outside the bunkers, but no sign of compromise in the Klingstone. The crew will skim the silt off the surface then restock with fresh sand to desired depth. The sand is essentially dry in many places which is a wonderful deviation from the sand we had prior to the project!

The greens have drained as hoped and there is no sign of turf damage there, or on the tees. Grass can withstand submersion in water for 4-5 days so we are still ok with areas as mentioned above.

Stay tuned...

Starting to Gain Ground

Mother Nature finally spared us some of her torture last night and as a result we are really gaining ground on the standing water. As of this morning, the only major golf course areas with standing water were the 7th and 11th fairways. We have already made serious progress there this morning. By days end we should have all the standing water in the fairways removed. When the fairways and bunkers are complete, we will begin working on pumping out as much of the roughs as possible. With 85 degree temperatures forecast for Monday and Tuesday, it is a race against the clock to get the water off and save the grass from cooking in the afternoon sun.





About 90% of this water has already been removed this morning.


The Range, Short Course and Chipping green will remain closed until further notice. Our first, and only priority, is to remove water from the property and save grass. As soon as we can spare some bodies to address the water issues of the Short Course and Range, we will get them pumped out and re-opened.

Thank you for the continued patience and let's all hope tomorrow's forecast for more thunderstorms is completely wrong.

Photos of Today's Rain Event

Below are some images from today's rain event:


Hole #1




Hole #2




Hole #12




Short Course #'s 1 and 6

A Rain For The Ages!!!

I am sorry to inform all of you the all golf course related operations are now closed until further notice. This does include the Short Course, Range and Chipping/Practice green. The property has just received 2.7 inches of rain in the last 90 minutes. To be honest, this is the worst rain event I have seen in my 12 years at the club. With more HEAVY rains forecasted for this afternoon and again tomorrow, these closures may linger for a few days. I am keenly aware that the holiday weekend is approaching and I will do everything in my power to re-open things ASAP.

Day 3 - Mother Nature's Curveball

Mother Nature gave us a quick reminder that she will be in control of this project yesterday afternoon. Everything was cruising along until about 4pm when the skies opened up and belted us with 1.1 inches of rain. It's never a good thing to see bulldozers and puddles in the same photo as shown above. The bad news is the rain shut us down for the day. The GREAT news is that because of how dry the course was going into the rain event, the course soaked up all of the rain overnight and we are back at it, full tilt this morning.

Before the rains came yesterday much was accomplished. The 18th green sub grade was completed and awaiting Mr. Doak's approval. The 2nd green is very close and the shapers hope to make a few final tweaks this morning in order to have that one ready as well. The 12th green was completely cored-out and the 13th and 16th greens were about 90% done when the rains came.

This morning we are already back in the 13th and 16th greens and should have those core-outs finished within hours. Moving on from there we will be headed to the 15th, 6th, and 14th greens. We continue to strip additional tees and have begun stockpiling all the extra soil spoils near the new 17th green site.

Mother Nature may have one this battle, but we will win the war!!!