Shade issues

Now that the grass has mostly greened up and looking like summer time, we can finally see what damage the winter left us to deal with.  One area of turf in particular that is quite thin and unsightly is the grass around the greens on holes #13 and #15.  This grass is zoysia grass, and while it does like the shade more than bermuda grass, it still needs plenty of sunlight to survive and grow correctly.  These areas around the greens on #13 and #15 are the same areas we fight each year coming out of winter dormancy.  The only way to solve the problem for good it to remove the trees, but in some instances we do not own the land the problem trees grow on.  Take a look below at the pictures to see the shade issues I am talking about.

These pictures of #15 green were taken at 11:15am.  You can see the shade line across the green, and the whole right side of the green (as you play the hole) is still in shade.  The sun rises each day before 7:00am, so that is 4 hours of daylight this area of the green and surrounding turf is losing each day.  The putting green, on the other hand, receives full sun throughout the whole day, and the grass around the green is full and healthy.  There are other factors of course which cause these areas to struggle each year, but lack of sunlight is predominately why we see issues each spring when the grass greens up.

We have sod coming for these areas next week and will get it repaired quickly so it can grow-in and become healthy this summer!

Azaleas on #17 starting to bloom!

A few years ago our grounds staff, along with a generous donation from the LGA, took on the project of cleaning up the tiered area in front of #17 tee.  After removing the overgrown shrubs and vines that were originally planted there, we stained the walls and prepared the beds for the new azaleas.  Here is a look at the site before we planted anything.

Once we had the wall at this stage, we were ready to plant the azaleas.  We chose a mixture of different azaleas to plant and everything looked good.  Unfortunately, we had a very strong freeze in November that Fall and it killed 90 percent of our plants. We were not satisfied with the results, and decided to re-plant the entire azalea bed with a different variety of azaleas.  Fortunately, no more problems since we replanted and the plants are starting to really look good.  Take a look at the picture below to see how much they have matured this Spring!

It is a little hard to see how well they have grown, but you can see the colors of the Spring blooms!  We will keep grooming this area until each Spring is shows us beautiful foliage like this!

Time to Fertilize!

Today we had the big truck come to fertilize the entire golf course!  The fertilizer we put down is a slow-release fertilizer that will feed the grass for 5 months.  We put it down now so that the grass will have it to feed on all summer long!  With the golf course greening up much earlier this year it should be great timing to get the fertilizer down on the ground and in the soil for whenever the grass would like to use it!  

Heavy Rains Last Week

If you were in the metro Atlanta area last week you are well aware of the heavy downpours we received last Monday and Wednesday.  On Monday, we had heavy downpours of rain that totaled 1 inch in about an hour and a half.  On Wednesday, a much heavier line of storms came through and brought another 3.1 inches of rain to an already saturated golf course.  The storms Wednesday also included winds that were strong to enough to topple a large pine tree on hole #1.  This weather trashed the golf course by washing out the bunkers, blowing debris from the trees everywhere, and making the grass impossible to drive on without doing damage.  Take a look at some of the pictures from the aftermath below!


Just to put it into perspective the 4 inches of total rain this week is more than we had from August 1st to November 28th 2016!  That is more rain in a 3 days span than almost 4 months last Fall!!