What Are The Blue Dots?

What are the blue dots around some of the greens are for ? The answer is that we are marking the locations for fence posts that will installed to support material to protect the greens from winter wildlife damage. The post will be spaced every 25 feet to provide enough support for the fencing material. Once we have layed out the initial post configuration we will then locate the underground irrigation system components before any posts are installed. 

You all are aware of the damage that was caused to the greens by the Elk last year and we will be doing all that we can to avoid a repeat of that damage. Currently the greens are scheduled to go on temporaries beginning December 1st as they are every year, at this time the greens will be closed off with fencing for the remainder of the winter season. There is also a chance that some of our more trafficked greens will get fenced off before the December 1st date, the most likely candidates for this would be greens #4,#6 and #10. In one night the damage caused by the Elk can require month’s of recovery time that includes wasted man hours installing thousands of replacement turf plugs to the greens.

These fences will be eight feet tall in order to keep the wildlife from jumping over them. We are still currently engineering the final configurations of the fences, but at this point they will be constructed out of steel fence post and tennis wind screens will serve as the fence boundaries. The reason we are using a fabric as the fencing itself is so that we can still easily access the greens during the winter for maintenance purposes. A more rigid material will become unworkable in the middle of winter when temperatures are routinely in the single digits.

Once again the Board has stepped up and provided the necessary funding for this extremely important project of protecting our greens. In the next several weeks we will begin to install the post for the fences at the greens locations in advance of the ground freezing. These post will be in play, so if your line is effected you will be allowed to take a drop from the obstruction. These post will be an inconvenience for some of our later season play, but I believe the benefits will far outweigh the damage that is caused annually. The wildlife is spectacular to see up close and personal, but it comes with at a price.

Evening Play

The golf course has been a busy place over the last week, but it has not been from golfers. The Elk and Deer have been extremely active on the course causing their normal damage this time of the year.

What makes the damage bad is the fact that the turf is soft and saturated from the melting snow. Until the ground freezes we will continue to sustain maximum damage from the wildlife. My staff will be repairing the damage by stepping down the hoof prints and filling them with sand and seed. This will be an ongoing situation for some time until the weather cooperates and begins to freeze the upper surface of the soil.

The wildlife is nice to look at, but they sure cause a lot of damage to the golf course each and every year.

Tree Limbs Broken
Elk Duds
Hoof Prints On #11 Green

Damage To #7 TeeDamage On #11 Fairway