Aerification and overseeding completed

After 1.6" of rain on Monday and Tuesday and finishing up overseeding during play the past two days we are done. We aerated all the greens Monday and overseeded 4 holes. Monday around 5pm the rain shut down the overseeding and did so again all day Tuesday. We did all but 2 fairways yesterday and finished up this afternoon. Below us a picture of the guys overseeding 16 approach and around the green late Wednesday night.

Practice Green

We always get a lot of traffic on the practice greens. One problem we get is people practicing in one spot around one cup and not moving around. Usually it just leaves foot prints for a couple days (which is not good) but this week someone camped out and killed the grass. If you see someone planted in one area please remind them to move around.

Aerification and Overseeding

We will be aerating and overseeding on September 17th and 18th. The golf course and range will be closed both days. The greens have recovered nicely from the summer stress and will be in great shape coming out of aerification. Here is a picture of #9 from late last week and it was one of the worst greens. You can see how it has recovered nicely.

Piebald Deer

Tim Foster, Director of Instruction here at Bear's Best took some pictures of a piebald deer fawn last week here at the club. He also did some research and here is what he found out about the piebald deer.

A genetic variation produces the piebald condition in white-tailed deer, not parasites or diseases. Piebald deer are colored white and brown, similar to a pinto pony. Sometimes they appear almost entirely white. This genetic condition is rare, with typically less that one percent of the population being affected. Often fawns born with this condition do not survive at birth, or if they do are easy prey because they lack the normal camouflage coloration.

2012 Member/Guest

The 45 hole Member/Guest is in the books. While the weather was very hot, the greens rolled very well and the course played firm and fast. Congratulations to all the flight winners. Below are some pictures from Saturday morning and afternoon.

#5 Green Saturday AM

#1 Green and Fairway

Golf Course Maintenance Cookout

Last week Craig Riddle, GM and Kevin Murphey, food and beverage director treated the GCM staff to grilled steaks and sides. We had a great time as Paul and Bianca added their own flair as well to the cookout with tortillas and Pico De Gallo.

Club Championship

This past weekend we had a successful Club Championship. The weather was great. Here is a great picture of the golf course maintenance crew early Saturday morning around 5:30 double cutting the greens and prepping for the day. The lights are from the greens mowers and other vehicles and equipment on the course.

Saturday AM Setup At TPC SAWGRASS for The Players

This is a video of the Saturday morning setup at The Players Championship.  There are many other videos from this week at the tournament in their blog that you can click on under the "Blogs I Follow" to the right of this blog.  Pretty cool stuff

Two down, two to go

We installed the fan on #14 on Wednesday and the fan on #15 today amongst the outings. The bases are installed on #6 and #13 and are just waiting for the fans. The wiring has been trenched in and once the fans are installed our electrician can come and hook them up. This has been a big project that has taken some time to come to fruition, but will benefit the greens greatly when the hot humid weather hits.

New Infield Grass at Turner Field

As I have been watching the Braves the first few games at Turner Field I noticed the difference in color from the infield to the outfield grass(turf need I know). This made me do some investigating and I found this article in the AJC.

"New Infield Grass at Turner Field Designed to be Slower." by Carroll Rogers

The new bright green infield grass at Turner Field is not just for show, though many have noticed the difference during the Braves’ first home stand of the season.

Braves head groundskeeper Ed Mangan planted a new kind of infield grass this season in the hopes of slowing it down for the sake of the Braves infielders. The Turner Field infield is known for being quick, and Mangan planted a thicker grass he hopes will remedy that.

Mangan said he’s been testing out a variety of grass called “paspalum” in the bullpen and center field sod farm, for a few years, and decided to try it out this season. He plans to use it only on the infield for now, but might eventually plant it in the outfield too.

Paspalum was originally found in sand dunes of South Africa, Mangan said, and is used on beach area golf courses because it can withstand a higher salt content in water. What makes it useful for the Braves is that it’s a little softer than the hybrid Bermuda “419” they’ve used for years.

“Just looking for something to take a little bit more speed out of the ball on the infield,” Mangan said. “So far so good. So we’ll see how it pans. But just walking on it, you can tell a big difference.”

Second baseman Dan Uggla said he could tell a difference walking on it – “It feels spongier,” he said – but not necessarily fielding groundballs.

“You can’t really tell that much difference in it,” Uggla said. “I think it may be a tad slower.”

Third baseman Chipper Jones, who’s been playing a lot longer on the infield at Turner Field, has noticed a difference.

“I like it,” Jones said. “It was a really fast infield. It was almost like playing on Astroturf sometimes. This will slow stuff down. It’ll take some steam off.”