Starting tomorrow morning, we'll be switching to the new bunker rakes I described in a post last week. The surface we're left with is far superior than the one created with standard metal leaf rakes, in my opinion. If you watch the PGA Championship at Southern Hills this week, you'll see the same rakes in use in their bunkers. Again, these rakes were developed by former Walker Cup player and friend of Highlands CC, Jim Sorenson. I'm also experimenting with 4 smaller models that you'll see in the bunkers on #9 and the greenside bunker on #17. I'll be anxious for you to try them out and offer feedback. The golf course maintenance staff is using a slightly larger model of this rake to prepare the bunkers for play each morning.
On another note, there are a couple tees, specifically #5 and #17, where we are seeing some turf thinning. What is causing this is still somewhat a mystery. We aerified those tees this morning. The common theme is that the infected tees are growing in environments that receive little to no sunlight. This is an example of why it's so important for turf to receive ample sunlight; specifically 8-10 hours a day. If a pathogen infects the grass, there is simply no way for the turf to fight it off. It won't recover. If we don't see recovery soon, we will more than likely go ahead and re-sod these tees in question. In total, its 3 tee boxes; two on #5 and one on #17. Think of a person in poor over health that becomes ill. Their body is so compromised due to poor diet etc. that they can't survive any kind of secondary infection. Grass behaves much the same way.