Mowing of the Native Areas

In the spring we decided to let a few areas on the golf course go Native. We did not mow these areas at all this season (until recently). Leaving these areas unmowed reduces labour and fuel expenses. We did however apply a herbicide to some of these areas in the spring. This is not an extra cost, we would have applied in the mowed bluegrass regardless. We will be looking at interseeding these areas with a blend of fescues in the future. These areas proved to be a compliment to the property, adding contrast and framing of the holes in which they are on. We will be mowing these areas a few times this fall and once in the early spring. The reason for multiple mowings in the fall is to "chop up" the organic matter produced from mowing such tall grass. This practice is a form of weed control for some of the woody species that tend to grow in these areas. A mowing in the spring will wake up the grasses an get them growing early on. This process has started and will take a week or so to complete, the recent rain has set us back a bit. Although the areas are mowed, we would ask that carts are not taken into them.

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Bunker construction on # 17

The past few days we have been able to make great strides on the bunker project on #17. All three of the new bunkers have been shaped and drained. Tuesday morning Ian Andrew our consulting golf course architect, will be painting the final contours in the bunkers. We will then install the bunker boards and back fill with topsoil to the new edges. Once the edges are established we will add the new sand and await sod. The rain and snow that we recieved over the last couple of days has had little effect on the rough shaping process. We are hoping for some drier days to complete the fine tuning and sod prepping.

Golf Course Update

As our season slowly comes to a end our department has been working away at year end projects. We installed drainage in a few areas of the practice range and short game area. These areas were perpetually wet and caused turf and aesthetic issues. We have also been chipping away at the bunkers on #17, smoothing out the faces and recreating the grass edges. These bunkers suffered some severe frost heaving in the faces during the winter after they were built. Our team has removed a number of trees and brush from around our maintenance facility to allow some expansion of our operation. We are working away at clearing space to install aggregate bins and sufficient staff parking. This will also allow delivery trucks and semi's to access our facility without any issues. We are also removing the fallen trees and brush from the woodlot on the right side of #16 fairway. This is a challenging area to work as it is a peat bog and remains wet even in the hottest and driest of summers (like 2010)...

Finish Grading on #2 & #12 Tees

With the great weather that we have had the last two days, we were able to get the tees shaped and all of the tee mix out to the tees. In this picture here, Derek Vergeer (our contractor) is finish grading #2 Tee to be ready for sod. Unfortunately the forecast is for rain the next couple of days and could hold us up for a bit. We are doing out best to complete these projects in a timely manner, of course with this blog we will keep you updated.

HIGHLAND CC GROUNDS

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