YouTube Vlog

 Obviously it has been awhile since I have posted here.  I will be posting here only sparingly in the future if a topic warrants extra explanation or pictures.  But instead of this blog we will be putting out short videos on YouTube.  These vlog posts will allow us to explain topics more quickly and with video that should illustrate what we are trying to convey.  So it should be easier for us and more informative and quicker to digest for you.  We will hope to get these 1-5 minute videos out weekly keeping you more up-to-date with goings on at Wild Horse.  A few videos have been posted at the Wild Horse Golf Club channel already so check them out and leave feedback as to what you like or dislike.  We are not great videographers but hope to get better and highlight the best Wild Horse has to offer.  Tune in!

Summer heat

 There has been many times I've been going to sit down and write another blog but other priorities seem to keep me from doing so once again.  We struggled through a seemingly cold May and are now baking in summertime heat.  Just good ole Nebraska weather.

We believe that May is when we really make up ground and the course rounds into form about Memorial Day.  That was no exception this year.  The month of May is used to recover from aerification and thicken up the stand of turf.  It can be tricky to manage for consistency then due to the swings in weather and that limits the quality and consistency of the greens.  But by late May our brushing and plant growth regulation schedules start to improve the greens quality.  This year was no exception and greens really improved in the last week of May as we hoped.   They are usually the last part of the course to get to where we want them and that is mostly due to bentgrass liking just a bit more heat than the other grasses we manage.  

Now we are into full summer mode and the course is looking and playing well for the Nebraska State Match Play this week.  We always enjoy seeing how the course presents for good competitors.  There were some very good scores with playing condition hot but not windy.  

We have been working on a new poa control program this spring on some fairways (6, 14, 15, 17).  That was going well until our last application which, while it achieved good control on the poa, it also damaged some of our good grasses.  This caught us a bit off-guard as previous apps did not affect our turf that much.  A sharp increase in temperature and our experimentation with a slightly more acidic solution seemed to really ding the ryegrass.  So you will see some thinning in those spots in the short term.  But in the long term we should come out with a more consistent stand of bluegrass.  That is one of those learning moments that will help guide us next spring.   

We liken poa control to cancer chemotherapy because it is very hard on the patient in an attempt to kill the cancer.  And they may look really tough for awhile, but in the long term the goal is to get rid of the bad and the patient survives.  And so too we expect the turf to recover and be better in those areas in time.  That recovery is being hindered by some very unusual grub activity (for this time of year) and the hot weather but slowly and surely through the summer our turf will get better there.

That really is the only concerning areas on the course right now.  Greens, approaches and fairways are looking good right now as is the wooga.  The May rains provided good moisture for some of the wildflowers that call the rough home.  It started with Western Wallflower (yellow), progressed to shell-leaf penstemon (pink flowers near cabins), and now spiderwort (purple clusters between 7&8) is giving color to the wooga.  I'm not busy chasing my golf ball so I notice these things-hopefully you too take time to appreciate the diversity and beauty of our "wooga"

Until next time good golfing!

Kudos to crew

Today we will finish up topdressing on the aerated greens.  First time I can remember aerating and topdressing in a snowstorm.  And for that I want to give kudos to my small crew that for some reason keeps showing up to work in 35 degrees/35 mph wind.  It has not been pleasant to finish up our spring aeration session but thanks to my crew we will get it done as scheduled.  

As greens start to heal up from aerification, we will start to focus more on putting quality and you should see a noticeable improvement in the next couple of weeks.  The rest of the course has just been sitting there for the past three weeks with the weather we have had.  At one point we were ahead of schedule and now the turf seems to be at or behind what is normal for late April.  But that is not unusual for spring in Nebraska and we really don't see our turf doing much until we get into May.  The next 3 weeks should see much improvement in that regard.

There has been a delay in the VFD that controls our new irrigation motor due to supply chain issues but we are happy to report that it is now installed and we will start programming it today.  Super excited for this upgrade.

So while it has been a little bit of a trying aerification season, we are certainly excited for the upcoming golf season and are expecting great conditions.

 

Spring Progress

It's been a warm and windy start to April for sure.  The warmer temps have allowed us to get a good portion of the fairway aerification done (only holes 2 and 3 left).  Hope to finish up this week which will allow us to move greens surrounds aeration up to next week on the 13/14th from the 26/27.  That way we can get out of your way sooner while weather may not be ideal for golf.

The course is farther along than most years but when it is 80 degrees people wonder why it's not greener?  It just takes time for grass to get moving when soil temperatures are still in the forties.  So even though you are in your shorts, the turf's legs are still in the fridge!  

As we have said many times before, April is our set-up month with aerification and fertilizer and chemical applications coming in the next few weeks that prepare the turf for the prime golfing months ahead.  So while many of you expect fast greens right out of the gate, we are certainly not pushing for superb playing conditions at this point.  As we transition out of aerification season and weather conditions become more stable our focus will shift towards better playability.

We were able to execute our burn on Monday on a very warm and dry day.  Fortunately the wind stayed manageable but even with that the fire was quite volatile.  So we were able to complete most of the areas, but we left some on the outside of #14 and #2 just because it was too dangerous and difficult to control the fire like we wanted.  But all in all another good burn day for Wild Horse.    I appreciate my staff and some extra volunteers for their hard work to pull it off.  It has become a rite of spring here at Wild Horse, but should not be taken for granted.  We have been doing this for twenty years now and feel pretty experienced at it, but it is still a relief to get it done right without incident.  

Here we go

Its golf season again and the course is looking as good as it can this time of year.  The snow cover did its job as expected and both greens and fairways are looking nice.  It is easy to see how important that snow coverage was as there are a few mounds (putting green, #14, #9 are examples) that still had some snow cover albeit not very thick and those places are still brown while everything else has greened up.  Without a cover it would be looking much poorer.  So we got lucky this year.

We are in process of doing our normal spring duties.  I have started to work on irrigation-going through each station and making sure it is operating normally.  There are always a few sprinklers that don't work for a variety of reasons and now is a good time to repair them to ready them for the season.  

Todd is working on path entrances and exits trying to eliminate the bump at the transition.  This is a never-ending task.  Wind and water move the finer sands off the path and it piles up in the turf border creating a lip there.  We try our best to keep that transition smooth but mother nature is always working against us.

Together Todd and I will be adding and reshaping bunkers as needed.  We had some pretty fierce winds early in the winter that really moved some sand around in bunkers so we will be working on them in the next couple weeks before we really get busy aerating and mowing.

Speaking of mowing, our first greensmowing is probably going to be around March 20-about a week ahead of "normal".  

Then our next task is aerification of fairways starting around April 1.  The aerification schedule looks like this for the spring (pretty similar to past springs):

Fairways        April 1-16

Greens          April 18-19  (again small needle tines followed by topdressing on April 20)

Surrounds     April 26-27

Tees                May 10-11

Winter reading and listening

Yikes it is cold-We are so fortunate to have great blanket of snow protecting our turf!

It's that time of year when the days are getting shorter, golf is on TV, and we all know despite this cold snap that spring is just around the corner.  We, like you, are excited for another season of golf at Wild Horse.  To pique your interest here is an article on Wild Horse from Golf.com  Below that is a podcast that I did this winter.  Not that riveting, but perhaps it will pass another hour of time until our March 15 opener.

Stay warm!

Why Wild Horse Golf Club is the best course you've never heard of

 Superintendent Series, Episode 12: Josh Mahar - Wild Horse GC - The Fried Egg

New well drilled

 

Thanks to Sargent Irrigation and Gothenburg Irrigation for drilling us a new irrigation well yesterday.  We are very excited about this new water source for our irrigation.

It was an interesting and educational experience to watch this process take place.  Really quite amazing to see a well driller in action.  Below is the drill bit used.  

16" casing was set to 310 feet with the static water level around 40 feet.  The pump itself will probably be set around 125 feet but that will be determined after the test pump today.

This well was drilled under the same parameters as our other irrigation well and I would assume our pumping capacity will be similar.  Test pumping will take place today to determine exact specs.  The last well produced nearly 1500 gallons/minute free flow and we try to run about 1,000 GPM during our irrigation cycles.  Our sprinklers are nearly all the same and run 52 gpm so we are running about 20 heads at a time during an irrigation cycle.

Winter Update

In many other parts of the country the summer is the toughest time for turf with disease, drought, and heat affecting turf stands, but as we have mentioned before here at Wild Horse the winter is our most concerning time as a turf manager.  Luckily this year has been good so far.  We haven't received much moisture, but what we have has come as snow that stuck and didn't blow around like usual.   That provided a much needed blanket and consistent moisture throughout the course.  Another benefit has been the relatively mild temperatures with only a few single digit lows so far.  The turf still has a tinge of green color to it now even in mid January which indicates desiccation has not taken place at all to this point.  So far so good!

The big news here at Wild Horse is obviously the departure of Don Graham, General Manager.  It will definitely be something new for me as Don and I have worked together for nearly the entirety of Wild Horse existence.  We wish Don the best in his new endeavor and appreciate the contributions he's made to the success of Wild Horse.  Although the clubhouse and maintenance operations are somewhat removed from each other, it is imperative that we work together to provide a great golfing experience for the customer.  So we look forward to finding a new golf pro that can continue Wild Horse's success.

Other than that our winter work continues as normal with mower maintenance and reel sharpening in full swing.  This work can get monotonous but when you see those freshly ground blades scything over a new bedknife, it reminds us of the beautiful look and smell of a fresh cut fairway on June morning.  I'm sure all of you are looking forward to that as well.

Season Recap and New Irrigation Well

Hey we are back after a terribly long hiatus through the season.  I apologize to the 12 of you that actually read and look forward to this sh__!  I just kept pushing this off to the last of the list and never got it done-no excuse.  Sometimes it becomes difficult to come up with something that is interesting but I will try to do better in the upcoming year.  

I guess to recap the year it was a very good one at Wild Horse considering the pandemic.  Many people found the golf course as a place to get out and enjoy fresh air and we are thankful for your continued patronage.  As far as the golf course was concerned it was another outstanding year turfwise.  We came out of winter well and despite a terribly dry year the course was good throughout.  The first half of the season was just OK in my opinion,-some days I thought it was good, others not so much so I guess average.  I thought the last half of the year was really consistent and better than the past couple so it was great to end on that note.

The big news of the fall for us is the conversion of our irrigation from a natural gas power unit to electricity.  You can see below the final placement of the transformer that will supply power to a whole new motor and well.

We have contemplated this for some time and felt the time was right to give ourselves a more reliable power and water source for our irrigation. The three phase electricity necessary has been installed.  A new well will be drilled sometime in January.  Then we can install the motor and VFD and begin plumbing into our existing system sometime after that to be ready to irrigate when season starts.  This will be a huge upgrade over what has been a workable but spartan pumping situation.  We are excited to bring this online and it will be a great infrastructure improvement at Wild Horse.

One last quick note about the winter weather.  It has obviously been very dry, but the last snow covered everything nicely.  And although it held little moisture and melted quickly it was just what we needed to keep the crowns of the plant moist.  We do expect to need to water greens sometime this winter, but this little snow sure helped for the time being.

Hope you all have a Happy Holiday and we all most certainly look forward to a more normal and great 2021.

Whats up with those fairways?

We have continued maintenance as usual with a few modifications to keep ourselves and crew safe during the coronavirus pandemic.  But for the most part the on-course activities have been proceeding as normal.

Aerification is nearly complete with only tee boxes left to do.  We just finished up greens and will be topdressing them tomorrow.  They are in good shape and we expect them to heal quickly and then we will start to focus on putting quality in about ten days.

The course looks pretty good for the most part except for a couple of fairways notably #12 and #14.  These were treated aggressively last fall to remove Poa annua.  It worked well and much of the Poa was killed leaving some voids and overall thinning.  These treatments however can be pretty hard on our "good" grasses particularly bluegrass and that is showing up now with thinning and delayed green-up.  Other fairways that were treated 5, 6, 7, 17 also show signs of thinning but not to the extent that is occurring on 12 and 14.  These fairways were looking pretty good early this spring but the couple really hard freezes late in the year definitely took their toll.  We did do some seeding on the very worst spots and will really push the thin areas with fertilizer to help them thicken up.  We expect these areas to really respond as temperatures warm and will see noticeable improvement in the next month.  By June 1 these fairways should be very nice and pretty much poa free.  These pictures illustrate the difference in green-up in #16 fairway (untreated) and #14 fairway (treated)

Here is another shot of the thinning and slow development on #14.  So while it may not look the greatest right now the long term benefit of keeping the Poa population in check is our goal with these treatments.

Covid-19

I just finished testing PVC fittings to install in our cups to keep the ball from bottoming out in the cups so golfers won't have to touch the flagstick or the cup.   Did I just type that?  Weird as that would have seemed a month ago that is where we are at.

So what does this situation mean for Wild Horse maintenance specifically?  Well first and foremost is we want to allow use of the facility, but our concern is for the health of our customers and staff.  Don Graham, GM, has outlined our modifications to the clubhouse use and food and beverage service in an email to our customers, but we will talk here specifically about what will happen on course.

As mentioned in the opening line, we will be installing a pvc irrigation fitting into the cup so your ball will come to rest partially in the cup.  Players should avoid removing or touching the flagstick at this time.  Also carefully remove your golf ball avoiding touching the cup.
Rakes will be removed from bunkers to avoid touch point contamination.  Smooth bunkers with your feet or club.
Course bathrooms have not been opened for the year yet and will remain closed.
Water coolers and water fountains have not been implemented yet this year and will not be for the time being.

We are still about two weeks away from starting to mow, aerate, etc. on a regular basis.  That is generally when we bring extra staff on.  We will continue to monitor the situation and decide at that time if it is prudent to do so.  If not, Todd Bubak, assistant superintendent, and myself will handle any and all necessary duties at that time.  What does that mean?  Probably no aeration, limited bunker raking, limited changes in course set-up, and a concentration on basic mowing practices.

Again the situation is very fluid and can change overnight so we will try to keep you updated on what is happening out here, but we hope you can come out and enjoy golf and some quiet time at Wild Horse.
 

Snow mold

Here is something we rarely see out here at Wild Horse.  This is snow mold-a fungus that attacks turf under snow cover.  These spots are on the back of 15 green.

So why do we not see this more often?  Well the most likely reason is that we rarely have snow piled up on greens for an extended period of time.  Secondly the turf must be somewhat active as it was in late November when we received this snow.  Usually snow falls later in the winter when the turf has hardened off leaving very little green leaf tissue for the snow mold to infect.  These spots are amazingly circular and will show up for awhile but the grass should be able to grow out of it in time.  Snow mold can be controlled by applying fungicide in late November and we used to apply, but decided several years ago that it was just not necessary as snow mold pressure is very light during most winters. 

Opening Day

Opening day is still a few weeks away but its now within sight.  As stated in the last post we have moved the annual opening date from March 1 to March 15.  We did this because in most years the course really wasn't ready to open until later than March 1.  We will always be assessing the situation and will open earlier if conditions (both turf and weather) warrant.  As far as this year is concerned, it appears that the turf should be in relatively decent shape to handle some early traffic.  So weather in the next couple weeks will be the determining factor in when we open.   This is a way too early prediction but I would not be surprised to open on March 7, but stay tuned for the latest.

The past couple of years have really been great as far as turf conditions are concerned.  Good winters and timely rains have definitely helped us out.  Much of our routine will remain similar to years' prior, but a couple new tweaks will be tried to address some minor issues.  1)  Goosegrass has become more and more prevalent, probably due to extended warmer, wetter summers so we will utilize a different preemergent in some areas to address this increased weed pressure.  2)  Grub control has been a little sporadic the past couple years so we plan to use a different insecticide in some of the higher population areas.  3) We continue to expand the use of PGRs (plant growth regulators) both in areas covered and frequency of use.  When Wild Horse opened we would treat only greens, but we have over time developed programs for surrounds and fairways to take advantage of the decreased shoot growth, density, and disease suppression that PGRs offer.  All in all, turf under PGR is a better playing surface. 4)  Continued emphasis on maintaining the "wooga" in a playable but healthy and dynamic prairie sward through burning and different mowing regimes.  Look for weird mowing patterns or timing.  You will probably say why did they mow it that way?  but prairie management is at its best when it is random in intensity and timing.  5) We will be topdressing surrounds more regularly to create a surface more similar to the greens.  The turf conversion from bent to blue/ryegrass has improved the bounce and feel of the surrounds but we hope to make it even better with a more consistent topdressing program.  6)  Some treatments (last fall) to repel earthworms looked to be beneficial and we will continue to explore those this spring.

The spring aeration schedule is as follows:
Fairways-  April 6-17 (1-3 holes/day)
Surrounds- April 20-21
Greens-      April 27-28  (solid needle tines-same as last fall and last spring)
Tees-        May 11-12

Winter update

It's been awhile since I have posted anything here partly because fall flew by and partly because I thought "who reads this s____ anyway?"  Apparently there are a couple others besides my mom so it is time to get back to keeping  you informed on the goings on here at Wild Horse maintenance.

October was very chilly and we even dropped below zero in October which really slammed the door on the season.  The turf browned off considerably and I thought uh-oh it could be one of those tough winters.   But December was relatively mild and the turf is looking pretty good at the halfway point of winter.  We have had some moisture through snow and rain which has been beneficial.  Below are the wind-whipped drifts left behind after the late December snowstorm.

Todd Bubak continues to prep our equipment for the summer season.  Each cutting unit is disassembled and checked for any repairs necessary.  Then they are ground (sharpened) and  reassembled.  This is a necessary task but it can be a bit tedious and time consuming considering we have 36 cutting units to service most years.  So if you ask what do we do during the winter?  Servicing equipment is our main task and while we don't have a large fleet it definitely keeps us busy.

Before we moved into the shop for the winter work, Todd was able to build a new cart path up to and around 5 green which will be put into play this spring.  This will eliminate the traffic in front of six tee making that a more safe situation.   Also the flow of carts should be better with less congestion near the bathrooms.  We are also in the process of adding gravel to paths to keep them in good condition.

Opening date this spring will be March 15 (not March 1).  We felt this was a better timetable to put traffic onto the course.  If conditions warrant we will allow play before that time.

August 15 Update

Maintenance Update August 15, 2019

Summer is starting to fade away which means aerification season is just ahead.  The schedule follows:

August 18-22 Fairways

August 26-27  Greens surrounds

September 4-5 Tees

October 14-15  Greens (same as we have been doing with small ¼” tines)

This schedule is pretty much the same as we have done previously so you can expect similar conditions as last year.

Everyone keeps telling me how easy it must be this summer with all the rain.  Well we haven’t ran much irrigation but that hasn’t decreased the workload any.  The heavy rains have kept us busy fixing cart paths and bunker washouts.  It may look like everything is fine once you arrive, but the crew has been busy putting the place back together.  The rain and continued wetness have also increased disease pressure but we are trying to weather that storm until better drier weather arrives.

Maintenance update July 6

Summer just keeps rolling along and I apologize for not doing an update in June.  Days are flying by and we have already arrived at Member-Guest weekend.  This has become a very popular tournament and we always hope to have the course peak at this time.  It is good timing for that as the heat of summer hasn’t taken a toll on the turf and the wooga is shining with wildflowers.  This year’s participants will find some receptive greens as recent rains have kept the greens softer than usual, but they are still rolling nicely.  We don’t do too much different for the event other than a double cut Saturday and maybe another roll on Sunday just to get them rolling a foot faster than our normal green speed. 



Our normal summer routine for mowing is greens daily, tees and collars 2x/week, and fairways 2-3x/week.  Traps are raked usually on Monday and Friday unless rain necessitates more attention.  Add in weekly rough mowing, and this keeps the crew of 7 part timers busy mowing away.  They get a lot done in short order and I am thankful for their help.



I mentioned the wooga and the abundance of wildflowers earlier and it has been a stellar year for spiderwort and larkspur shown below.  We have mowed a couple more passes around the fairways to try to keep those areas more playable and we will begin mowing more rough this week and continue through July to keep the “wooga” in check with all this rain.

Speaking of rain we have had a lot.  Only irrigated two nights in June (other than watering in product).  This has been a blessing (reduced irrigation demands) and a curse (increased workload fixing bunker and cart path washouts).  The turf looks great now but I am expecting more root diseases as we enter the summer season due to the constantly waterlogged soil we have experienced in May and June.  Brown Patch (shown below) while not a soil borne pathogen has already shown itself on ryegrass in collars and I think that has been due to the excessive moisture we have seen lately.  In other words the course looks as good now as it will for a couple of months until we head into fall.   That being said we still expect great golfing conditions coming up this summer.  Hope you can get out to the Horse and enjoy.

Update May 8, 2019

We have punched holes in greens this week and now are waiting to topdress.  Probably going to happen next week considering the wet weather.  Again this spring we used small star and ¼” solid tines to aerate greens.  This combo gives us numerous holes for water percolation and root growth but disrupts the surface very little.  Putting quality is still pretty good and will quickly return to normal in about 10 days.  We are quite pleased with the greens condition right now with good root development and healthy turf.  The height of cut continues to go down and we are nearing normal mowing heights.  That coupled with increased rolling should get the greens putting well by late next week.



May is the time when the turf really starts to move-not much happens in April.  As you have probably seen there are some seedlings up in the winterkilled areas.  Warm temperatures should get them moving along better in the next couple of weeks.  As is normal in the spring, soil temperatures have been at the bare minimum to germinate seed so we are happy to see what we have so far, but more seedlings should be emerging soon and development will continue.  This should help those thin fairway spots fill more quickly. 



We will be trying a couple of new Poa annua control products on certain areas of some fairways so expect to see some discoloration or thinning in the next month in those areas.  The rest of the fairways and surrounds are starting to look better every day with density and color starting to really shine.



The prescribed burn was executed on April 8 on a large portion of the perimeter of the course.  Only the areas around 10, 11, 14 were left unburned due to an unfavorable wind.  The rough has been a little bit delayed this year with the cooler temps, but expect thick gnarly wooga due to the ample soil moisture available this spring.



I am still trying to find a good time for the first course tour of the year so stay tuned for date and time for that.



Expect the course to start to come together in the next couple of weeks.


 Jmahar@live.com with questions or comments.

Aerification Changes

Quick update on the aerification schedule that has been altered by the snow.  The surrounds aerification scheduled for this week has been postponed until next Monday 22 and Tuesday 23.  That will require us to move tee aerification into May 13-14.  Greens aerification remains set for May 6 and 7.

Much of the snow has melted but huge piles remain in some areas.  We are working on clearing paths to expedite getting back out on the course.  We are hoping to get back to golf on Thursday (18th) as the high school tournament is scheduled for that date.  If we are able to get back to golf before that we will let you know as soon as we know.

Blizzard

You are probably sitting around surfing the net, watching it snow, peeking in on the Masters, and maybe wondering what's up at Wild Horse.  The wind and drifts are for sure-8" for us so no golf for awhile.  We will let you know when golf can be expected once we can assess the situation.  Turf areas will clear quickly but paths will be drifted so walking might be necessary for some time.

So what does the snow mean for us?  A definite change in the aerification schedule will be necessary and we will let you know those adjustments when we know.

We worked diligently to finish up fairway aerification and the burn this week before the storm.  Some have asked if that is all the burn and yes it is.  We wanted to get all of the perimeter done but that takes a perfect day to accomplish.  An unfavorable wind prevented us from burning around 10, 11, and 14.  Also our crew was wearing down and we didn't want to make a mistake.  We have started burning every other year rather than on a 3 year schedule.  Such as that is, it is not imperative to get all areas burned each year as we can pick up some the next year.  A huge thanks to my crew for their efforts each year to help manage the rough.

The ice damage that we have discussed prior is becoming more apparent as the turf greens up.  Whenever you incur damage it is sometimes difficult to determine whether it is best to "sow it or grow it".  It is always best in my opinion to grow it if you have enough surviving plants.  Why?  Because those viable plants will be at least 4-6 weeks ahead of any seedlings that you germinate so there is a huge time advantage by "growing it".  That means maximizing growth through extra fertility and limited mowing.  Many of our areas like those seen below fall into this category where there are enough surviving bluegrass plants that can fill in to achieve a desirable turf by the end of May.  There are fewer areas that incurred complete kills and will be seeded as soon as soil temperatures warm.  Those areas will take longer to achieve the density we want but expect them to be complete by the end of June.

A huge inconvenience to you and your game and our mowers is the escalating worm activity seen below.  Unfortunately there is no legal chemical control for earthworms.  There has been much research on cultural practices that reduce activity but no quantitative results have been achieved.  Recently though some products containing saponins derived from mowrah meal, green tea leaves, or seaweed have shown effectiveness at repelling earthworms.  We have purchased some of these products and are waiting for a warm spring rain to apply them.  Hopefully they work well for us and we can start cleaning up our greens and collars.

Enjoy your Masters weekend.

Spring Observations

Spring finally is in the air and we were able to open the course this past Friday March 15.  Thought I would share some observations on the course now that the snow is gone.  

This first pic is right after we removed the cover on the knob on #4 green.   As you can see the turf looks great under there, but the rest of the green also looks good just browner.  As expected the snow cover was good for the greens and they look healthy.  Expecting first mowing probably April 2-3 which will be about a week behind "normal".  

The next couple of pics show prairie vole damage that occurred on fairways under the snow.  They make little runways (seen in the first pic) and chew up the turf (second).  Only see this during snow covered winters when they feel safe under the drifts-otherwise they stick to the native grasses.  This damage is slight and won't be seen for long.

We have already mentioned the ice damage in previous posts that we were expecting.  Here it is on #5 fairway.  You will see it in varying degrees around all of our sump drains and anywhere large drifts laid for extended periods.  For the most part it was pretty superficial but 2, 5, 6, and 8 fairways have a some small areas that will need to be reseeded.  The rest should grow out of it soon.

The morning after the last rain storm I was checking out the course and found these steers taking shelter behind the plum thickets near 16 green from the brutal winds.  They left some tracks behind on 15 and 16 fairway and scuffed up 11 green seen below, but most of their hoofprints will fade away once mowing begins.  To my knowledge this is the third time that cattle have made their way onto the course.

Of course we had a lot of water on the course after the snowmelt and rain-probably as much as I have ever seen after a rain event.  Once the frost started coming out of the ground many of the puddles disappeared but as you can see from this pic of 12 fairway we did have some water to pump away. The soil moisture levels are saturated for sure so expect a bumper "wooga" crop!