Dredging is finally over, now the race to repair the damage!

Even though the weather outside today is terrible, there is still something to celebrate.  We are officially done with the dredging portion of the project!  All of the dredgers equipment was removed over the weekend and we are now focusing all our efforts to repair everything destroyed during the project.  As our staff works diligently every day on what seems like endless projects, the list of things for us to fix is getting smaller and smaller.  Some of the things we have worked on over the last few weeks include installing a drain on the left side of hole #3, repairing the new silt retention dams on both ends of the lake on #3, sodding and landscaping around the bridges and haul roads of #3 pond, and also working on #14 and #16.  This has left our crew with a balancing act of both maintaining the golf course, as well as working on restoring the course from the project.  We have done this by simply splitting up our staff into two different crews.  The construction crew, headed by our Senior Assistant Lyle Curry, will focus on the dredging repair and see that everything gets fixed properly.  The daily maintenance crew will be lead by Chase Newman, our Second Assistant.  The maintenance crew is vital to keep up with the growing demands of the golf course which increase more and more as temperatures rise.  As we move on more into prime golf season, we want the golf course to not be forgotten.  This temporary division of our staff will help us to be more efficient, as well as ensure we do not lose sight of any piece of the MCC property that needs our attention.  Take a look at a few pictures of our crew in action over the last few weeks.......

I think Max is the only one relaxing after sodding a whole truckload in one day!

Dredging moves across the street to lake #15!

Now that we have completed the big lake on #3, we have relocated the large equipment to the lake on #15 and begun the last part of our dredging project!  The plan is to dredge out the silt in the coves of #15 lake on each side of #14 green.  Take a look at the picture below and it will help you get a good idea of the 2 areas being cleaned out.

This picture was taken from between the tee box and green on hole #15.  The yellow piece of equipment closest to the camera is the pump lowering the water level.  We currently have the water 2.5 feet low, and it looks like this is all we will have to lower the pond to be able to complete the work.  By keeping the water in the pond we can ensure the safety of the fish and wildlife.  Notice on the left side of the picture is a large excavator used to dig a hole in the rough to the right of #14 green.  This hole will be filled with the silt from the pond, and then covered back over and sodded.  All of the dirt removed from the hole was transported along the cart path on #14 to help level out the abrupt drop off from cart path to playing surface.  If you look on the right side of the picture you will see the large 60 foot reach machine we used to dig out lake #3.  This machine is currently located in the cove between #14 green and #16 tee box.  We have begun the project on this portion of the lake, and will finish it before moving to the other side of #14 green.  This process should only take a few days, and we are hoping to be finished by the weekend and the predicted thunderstorms!  With some favorable weather we should be able to complete the entire dredging of lake #15 in a few days!

Here are some closer up picture of the process we will use to dredge the smaller cove on lake #15.  I will post pictures of the work in action to further illustrate the process in the days to come.

Here is John in the large excavator working dredging the left cove of #14 green.  It is a tight fit for such a big machine, but they got about 30% of the material removed in just one day!