Friday

Today marked the final day of work for our H2B visa staff.  We honored them with a big lunch as our way of thanking them for the sacrifices they make to come to HCC and add to our team in a big way!  We couldn't do without these seven gentlemen!

 

A day or two is all that is left to finish #1 drainage.  You can see these guys are working while frost is on the ground.  Driving and walking on frosted turf will cause it to turn brown.  The blades of grass die but the crown of the plant is remains protected.  When the weather warms in the spring, new shoots will emerge and the fairway will recover.  For now, time is money and we can't afford to work half days due to frost.  It's my goal to get this team in and out of here as fast as possible.  When the native soil freezes, this will be an impossible job.  We are racing against Mother Nature!

Above is the pile of spoils from the drainage ditches on the 1st fairway.  Note all the different soil types that coexist in a 2 acre fairway!

All the leaves are officially down and now that the course is cleaned up, it's time to clean up the creeks and streams.  Some leaf little in these areas is good for salamanders and other species but too much ultimately leads to sedimentation of our ponds and lake.  This is why I prefer to remove a bulk of the leaves.

Thursday

Approaches are be aerified with 3/4" hollow tines.  Once the course closes in a few weeks, we'll be applying a nice layer of sand over the turf.

After one application of sand to the practice tee, we pull a drag brush over the surface, which works the sand into the canopy.  Once this is finished, we'll be applying more sand and repeating the process.  You know there is enough sand applied when it can no longer be worked into the surface.

More drain lines are being trenched on the 1st fairway.

Practice Tee

30 tons of sand was applied to the practice tee which fills aeration holes and levels the tee. 

Drainage on #1

You can see by the photos that we're moving right along on the drainage on the first hole. A few lines have been trenched and already have the pipe, sand installed and the turf back on top.  If these guys work full days without be slowed down because of poor weather or frozen conditions, they can install about 800 linear feet per day.  The drain lines are on 8-foot centers and run a majority of the fairway.  As time goes on, I'll have better photographs for you to see.

7-Day Forecast

 

Chilly Morning!

 

14*F this morning feels like 1* with the wind chill.  Hap's still ready to chase his ball!

Monday

23*F and windy this morning made for a good wood splitting day!  We'll ultimately split 4-5 cords of wood for the Clubhouse and Hudson House, which is enough firewood to last a calendar year.

When the sun got up and the turf un-froze, we were able to aerate the practice tee.  Tomorrow we'll be applying 30 tons of sand to the tee to top off divots and help level the surface.  

Today marked the start of the drainage project.  We started on hole number one and will more than likely work our way around the course, in order by hole.  For the next 3 weeks, golfers will need to skip the hole we're working on.

USGA Green Section Record

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Click above for the latest edition of the Green Section Record.

2025 Annual Foot Golf Tournament

Below the towering pines at the historic Redbird Golf Links in beautiful Sapphire, NC, the 11th annual Greenkeeper FootGolf Invitational was held!  This annual event is always a fun day for the golf course maintenance team.  Winners for this year's event were...

1st Place: David (left), 2nd Place: Christian (center) and 3rd Place (right) Raul.  These guys are good!!

James even ended up playing from the stream!

Tee Aeration

 

Following DryJect and rolling, the putting greens are still playable despite the look of them.  Below, you can see we started aerating tees.  Despite the fact the golf course remains open for play, it is critical that we complete this work before the ground freezes, which becomes a common occurrence in December.  Once tees are complete by Friday, we will start on the approaches in front of the greens. 

Croquet Aeration

This morning, we are aerating all three croquet lawns.  Due to frost delays, Dryject also has to be completed today as well.  The croquet lawns will open this afternoon.  Golf course is closed until 12:30PM.

Monday DryJect

As scheduled, all 19 greens (PG included) were 'DryJected' today, two directions. Over 50 tons of sand was injected into the putting greens.

DryJect on Monday

This Monday, November 3rd, all putting greens will be 'DryJected' 2 directions. The golf course is closed Monday.  Please be advised that this process will impact ball roll but is necessary to do before the putting greens freeze this fall.  This is a critical program we've been doing for over 15 years to incorporate more sand into our root zone below the putting greens.  This is one of several tool that help keep our greens as firm as they are.  28 year old USGA greens rarely perform as well as ours and the reason for this is our commitment to aeration, topdressing and other programs like DryJect.

DryJect’s patented high-pressure water-based injection system creates aeration holes through the root zone to fracture the soil while its pioneering vacuum technology simultaneously fills holes with sand.

All in the Details…

This is always a good time of year to edge cart paths. Mowing turf has slowed but with the course still open, we cannot yet go into full winter work mode. After a summer of cart tires and mowers running over the edges, grass and mud is often pushed out onto the path- sometimes as much as 6” or more. Using this wheel mounted to a Ventrac mower, the edge is re-established. Then comes the labor intensive part- picking up 4 miles worth of grass strips along the edges of the path. It’s actually 8 miles since a cart path has two sides!  Some of the spoils removed look like pieces of sod that could be used to establish a lawn. In the end, it always makes the golf course look better and well kept. 

Bradley Klein Writing

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