It was a cold but productive day in Highlands. Tonight we are experiencing winds gusting to 40 mph. The 5th and 9th hole bunkers are complete and we lack only 2 bunkers and the front nine is finished. It is my goal to have the entire course completed by Wednesday. On the back nine we need to do 12,13,16 and one bunker on 17.
Jerry started fairway verticutting today. These vertical blades penetrate the surface about 1" deep, removing organic matter and thatch. Again, it is my goal to have this completed by next Wednesday. That means once the fairways are cleaned up after New Years, we can start to sand topdress fairways. Each year our fairways are aerified, verticut (many years 2 directions) and then topdressed.
Finally, I got a nice shot of the grove to the right of #6. No one will even notice a tree is missing despite the fact we removed nearly 35 trees. When trees grow on top of one another like many of ours do, they crowd each other and compete for the same nutrients. This is why it is important to thin them out. It makes for more majestic, specimen trees. In this case, all of these trees that were removed were rotten in places and were a safety hazard.
