This week at Blue Hills, the maintenance crew kept busy by cutting down and chipping up another tree that posed a problem agronomically as well as to the golfers. This tree in particular was located directly behind the right fairway bunker on number 18. The tree was close enough to the fairway that it posed a problem to the turf, but mainly we felt like the tree created an additional hazard, or a "double jeopardy" to golfers that were to land inside the bunker. The difficulty of shot would be hard out of the bunker, but it would be even more difficult to hit the shot out of the bunker and trying to avoid the tree as well. This is the first hole that was decided in this fashion, we will be looking at other holes/trees that have a similar setup throughout the winter months.
When we get rain it is a blessing here at the golf course. When we get a lot of rain, sometimes the effects can be a hindrance. When we take a look at our creek you will see exactly what I am talking about. In the last few years we have experienced multiple short bursts of excessive rain. These storms can bring a relief for a droughty turf in the summer, but when it comes to a water feature like our creek, the effects can be overwhelmingly destructive. The large amounts of rain will cause the creek to flood significantly, and when this happens there is a high chance for erosion to occur on the creek banks. This is especially true near the waterfall features of the creek.
There is a large washout near the stepping stone bridge behind the blue tee on 18. As you will see from the videos, the flow of water has managed to find a weak spot behind the rocks and is now flowing into the bank, the water then finds its way back into the creek.
One of the projects we hope to complete this winter is to create a long wing wall that expands into the creek bank. This wall will be made from poured concrete and will extend about 15 feet into the bank and placed at a 45 degree angle. This process will be tricky because when the waterfall was first designed it was placed on top of the city sewer. The stacked landscape rock was then placed through iron rods in the center to stabilize the waterfall rock. So with this in mind we will expand onto the existing foundation of the waterfall to create the necessary wing wall. Placing a wing wall at this length should help correct the flow of water and divert it back into the main stream where it belongs. We will then back fill the washed area with topsoil and bring it back to level.
These last few years we have been really working on cleaning out the canopy of the trees on our golf course. This winter we are continuing the process by cleaning out all the dead wood that has appeared in a lot of our oak trees. We contracted out a crew to come in and climb those tall oak trees. These climbers are professionals, they are able to climb the trees without spikes on their shoes so the trees aren't damaged during the process. They will start from the top working their way down the tree removing all the dead wood that is visible. The process should take only a few weeks since they are only concentrating their efforts on the oaks. Our crew then will come in later and limb up any maple trees that need it as well. This process is necessary for the health of the tree by severing off any portion of the tree that is dead. This will help keep unwanted insects from penetrating and entering those wounded areas and damaging the tree further.
Last week was a busy week for the Blue Hills Turf Crew. We had a group of people working on verticutting and another group of people working on the new installation of potable water to the bathroom on hole number 4.
The new installation of potable water to number 4 bathroom began with first locating the existing line. Next, we cut into, and branched off our new line towards the bathroom. After using the Dingo to help dig a trench, we inserted the newly assembled pipe into the trench and filled it back in.
Another cold day means another day we can work on projects. While we were digging next to cart paths we decided to go ahead and install a type of french drain system next to number 1 tee. If you can recall during rain events there always seems to be a decent sized puddle next to the flower bed on number 1 tee. We decided to install a drain box and create a drainage system to help contain and remove the water that would otherwise stand on the surface of the cart path and beside it.
We felt like this is necessary because the water that would gather along the cart path would sit on the surface, and on a hot day would bake and cause a scalding effect to the turf. The standing water on the cart path was an annoyance when driving through it on a cart as well.
Good Afternoon Blue Hills Country Club, the maintenance crew here at the club have been keeping busy during this cold weather. We had a great season this year and we are continuing this trend with some work next to our cart paths. When we first poured our cart paths a few years ago, the contracted work crew began first by laying the base foundation before the concrete was poured. This foundation was expanded to the size of our old asphalt paths. When we decided that we wanted to have some paths narrower than the old ones, this foundation wasn't shrunken down to size so it was left in the ground. So after it was all poured, our crew came back through and back-filled the voids next to the newly poured path with topsoil, free of rocks and gravel. There have been a few problem areas next to some tees and greens like hole 1 tee and green as well as hole 6 green.
We decided to take the mini excavator and dig down next to these cart paths. We began digging no deeper than 6-8 inches (The depth of the base rock should be), as we dug we found we were digging up the extra base rock. This is problematic because we only originally back-filled 4-8 inches of topsoil in some places. This means the topsoil wasn't deep enough to allow good root growth for the turf to be sodded. So, the extra foundation material would heat up excessively during the summer months and cause stressed turf. This makes it hard for grass to grow and to stay healthy. In order to remedy this problem we are digging down 8 inches and making it free of asphalt and gravel. We then are dumping fresh topsoil back in the holes and leveling them out. We will finish the process by placing sod on top of the back-filled soil.
