.....meaningful titles are sometimes hard to come by. Anyways, here's what's been happening over the past couple days. Last weekends forecast was pretty much on the nose regarding snow and cold. I went out on Sunday and put down the tarps and Enkamat before the weather hit but had to tweak the process a bit. Like I mentioned before, since we were unable to afford more Enkamat, I had planned to split it up amongst the greens that I think may need it the most. The new tarp for #15 green scared me because it is so 'impermeable-like" (remember anoixia? go HERE) so I used the Enkamat to cover close to 80% of the green to maintain an air gap before rolling out the new tarp. The remaining Enkamat was only able to cover a little less than 2/3's of #7 green (which is where the other impermeable tarp is located). So, obviously, the upper putting green, the back of #9 green and the lower tier of #6 green do not have any Enkamat. This is too bad since the condition of these surfaces in the spring were pretty good and I think that was partly due to the Enkamat.
The one unfortunate part with the arrival of winter at the beginning of the week was the wind that preceded the system. I staple the tarps to the ground and generally add extra on the side of any edge facing the prevailing wind. The wind last Sunday night was the dreaded "backwards wind" which meant it blew completely opposite to the way it normals comes. The end result was the semi-permeable tarp on #9 blew off. I've decided not to remove the snow from the green and expose it to all the predicted cold temperatures. I'll try to fix the tarp later.
I've mostly been inside during the mornings either reviewing expenses or looking into ideas I've had during the summer but didn't have time to investigate (for example, I think I've found a way to use my phones GPS and Google Maps to record and store in the "cloud" the fertilizer and/or chemical applications we make during the season. With that information we can be somewhat more accurate with our record keeping...something that may be a requirement in the ever changing "landscape" of pesticide regulations.) The rest of the day I continue to prepare equipment or areas of the golf course for winter.
One more thing. During the summer when I received positive comments about the condition of the course I would, at some point during the conversation, say something like "it's been a good year to grow grass" or something along that line. I wasn't trying to be modest but I was instead making an observation. An article written by an agronomist from the USGA Green Section comments on course conditions as they relate to weather. To be fair the article seems more to be referencing an apparent habit of players to equate good conditions with good weather while ignoring the importance of a superintendent and blaming the superintendent entirely for poor conditions while completely disregarding the impact of bad weather. Thankfully, to this point in time, that has never been a huge problem at this club for me. What I like about the article is the last two paragraphs which have a simple math equation that can be used to sum up course conditions in a succinct manner. Again, the gist of the article isn't overly applicable to our/my situation but it is some food for thought. Take a look HERE to read it.
