Kenmure Beautification

Every year right before Mothers Day the golf course maintenance crew devotes a large amount of time planting and placing the various annuals around the clubhouse and sports facilities. We take great pride in our landscaped areas and plantings around the club and hope that everyone enjoys them. The time and dedication towards grounds landscape and course beautification here a Kenmure would rival some courses that have a dedicated grounds staff. I The commitment my staff puts towards the beautification of the clubhouse grounds should be commended and I thank them very much for it. I hope that we can all share in the satisfaction of having a wonderful place to live, work, and play.

Crabgrass Confusion

I just wanted to let everyone know that I have heard from more than a few members about a crabgrass issue that does not exist. The confusion comes from the areas in the fairways that are growing back in naturally from last years damage. The bare spots have been slowly creeping back in from all sides. These edges produce long runners as they attempt to fill in. The edges of these areas are also difficult to cut with the regular fairway mower and they soon grow long and even form seed heads if they get long enough. These areas are especially prominent in #4 and #12 fairways. Those areas receieved a large amount of damage last year. We use weedeaters to cut back these areas when they get long. The damaged areas are almost closed back in now and will be easier to maintain.

Dry Spots + Cart Traffic = Turf Loss

Maintaining an even level of soil moisture throughout any of our fairways is a near impossible task. When attempting to keep the golf course on the drier side it is inevetible that we will have some spots that will burn. We attempt to use hand watering to spot treat these dry spots, but we only have so much labor. Using the overhead sprinkler system could keep these spots looking better, but at the same time it would overwater the rest of the fairway. The problem is magnified when carts drive over these hot spots in the afternoons. The tracks will remain visible until the grass can heal.

June 2011 Course Clippings

The golf course here at Kenmure is made up of mostly creeping bentgrass. Bentgrass prefers cooler temperatures and moist soils to preform at its best. The conditions around this area favor bentgrass for most of the year, but in the summer things can get difficult for the grass. When we are faced with very high air and soil temperatures the grass does not preform well at all. This becomes an even more difficult situation when we have large amounts of disease pressure as well as cart traffic. The three most important things that we do to keep the turf healthy are spraying fungicides, watering adequately, and managing cart traffic properly.
The spray program at Kenmure is something that much thought and planning go into every season. The club makes a serious investment every year into our chemical spraying budget. The spray program is very safe and all pesticides are applied under the supervision of licensed applicators. The products and formulations that are available in today’s market are very safe and have very low rates of use.
Water management is probably the most difficult job during the summer months. It is our goal to try and keep the fairways as dry as possible to allow for maximum ball roll. This task becomes complex during periods of high stress in our fairways. Heavy clay soils and subsurface rocks make trouble for us. The greens and tees have modified soils and can be easier to maintain than the fairways. The irrigation system is a very good tool but it definitely has its limits. We attempt to use hand watering as much as possible to get the water exactly where we want it.
Cart traffic becomes a large factor during later summer when most of the bentgrass roots have completely died in the fairways. The added stress from the golf carts in the summer is unneeded and very counter productive considering the time, money and effort spent on chemicals and watering. We will close different holes and sometimes the entire course to cart traffic if we reach extreme climate conditions.

Monday Course Closure

Every Monday the golf course closes to the membership to allow for a very important full day of golf maintenance.   Monday allows us to get the most out of our labor force and get everything in good shape for the coming week.  We also use this as an opportunity to spray chemicals in high traffic areas and perform small projects that would otherwise inconvenience the golfer when playing.
 
We would like to ask everyone to please help us take care of the golf course by complying with the course closure rule on Mondays.  The maintenance staff operates under the assumption that there will be no people on the golf course.  Events such as chemical application or fertilization may be occurring that would require golfers to stay off certain areas.  These areas ARE NOT MARKED because the golf course is closed and no one should be playing or practicing golf.  We also run irrigation from a central control on some Mondays and we always assume that no one is on the golf course because it is closed. We need to be assured that when the golf course is closed that it is actually closed.
 
Our Monday outside events are scheduled to start at noon (except for two large tournaments), giving the maintenance department the morning. This, along with an early work start, allows the maintenance staff time to work on the course.

We respectfully ask for your cooperation in abiding by the Monday closure rule.