Friday, September 14, 2012

Course Update

We are in the middle of our fall aerification program.  All the tees were aerified, and cleaned up last week and are starting recover.  This week we started the fairways.  We were able to to aerify 3 fairways, and this process will be ongoing, until all of the fairways are complete.  Since the course is rapidly growing many of our maintenance efforts are focused there.  Our goal is to aerify 2 fairways per day, during days that are dry and will give us the ability to pull cores and finish the cleanup process.  Greens aerification will be on Tuesday September 18th.  The course will be closed for this day.


Aerifying #13 fairway
Cleaning up the cores on #5 Tee

 
It has been a year since we started the claims process for dealing with the herbicide injury to the trees on the golf course.  There have been inquiries through the year as to when the trees will be removed, repaired and replanted.  We will taking down 74 damaged trees starting September 24th, which will start the process of repairing the quality of the trees on our course.  This process will take approximately 2 weeks, and the greens crew will be restoring the effected areas with seed and sod during this period.   We are working closely with an architect to provide a vision of quality plantings that will enhance FLCC and the golf course in the future.  Newly planted trees will be selected through the winter, and we will start the tree planting process this spring.

The greens crew have been working hard at pruning the Forsythia hedge behind 4 Green and 5 Tee.  This hedge has been a fixture on the property for along time and has received little attention.  By lowering the height and removing all the dead, stray branching, and invasive plants, we will be able to promote a much denser hedge.  Results will not come immediate but this hedge will make a healthy rebound next spring.

Hedge from Tee side
Hedge from Road side