If you're in town you know the somewhat blah weather has continued and, IMO, spring seem slow to come. Like 2017, I've been out removing snow and exposing cart paths and greens surfaces in an effort to get a jump on spring and to see what has happened under the snow over these past few months.
We started March with a good snow pack:
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| Close to 30" on 9G |
We needed to knock it down to a more manageable level since experience has taught me that, at this course, anything over 24" is chore!
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| Walking on the sun crust to spread black sand |
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| 2 days later |
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| 4 days later |
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| 9G one day after clearing |
We've pretty much had to do the same process for all the greens cleared to date. With little to no other areas open turf wise on the course much of the elk and deer began to eat any exposed turf resulting in more than a few frosty footprints showing up.
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| 5G with frosty deer tracks |
I've laid out tarps on most greens they seemed to be attracted to. I don't want to get too far ahead and we only have 7 spring tarps so I wanted to focus on tarping those greens that have been funky the last few years as well. To date we have 1,2,4,5,7,9, new PG, and 15 exposed and aside from damage from machine tires all the exposed greens look great - cold but great. Only 1, 7, and new PG don't have tarps but they will ASAP.
We'll keep removing snow on the front greens and will most likely let the back melt since those greens seldom cause us problems and, again, with limited man power I will have my hands full keeping up with the greens and tarps on the front nine.
