Range Behavior...

This video shot at the Philadelphia Cricket Club, shows the proper way to take divots on the range. Enjoy and educate yourself .
 http://mstachowicz.wordpress.com/2012/04/13/range-use-tutorial/

Spring Update

Well we have been busy the last couple of weeks here at the meadow. We have gotten a pile of work done, and will continue right up until opening day. We are still working to finish up the opening day work, but here is a bit of a recap of the last little bit.

1. Bunker work          

As you can see from the shot above, there has been quite a build of of sand on some of  the bunker faces over the years. This shot is from the front left bunker on #3 green.

        So with the help of Lyle Robinson, from Finishscapers, we began the process of peeling off the build up in order to reshape the bunker face.

This photo shows the final finish grade of the new bunker edge. We used drain tile to form a rough edge and it helped with the back filling and tamping of the newly added topsoil.

                                        
    This next shot shows the boys laying the new sod. I will update the final product in a future post.

                                                    

 The other bunker we worked on was the front right green side on #2. We actually completed the same treatment, and actually turned this misshapen bunker into 2 smaller bunkers.

                                        


2. Tee Decks

  Our other project from the last couple of weeks was the resurfacing of two tee decks. We are planning to systematically move through all of the white tee decks over the next couple of seasons. We chose to start with #4 white & #6 white. They were stripped, regraded, and resodded.

                                        
                                                   The boys stripping the old sod on #4

                                                      #4 graded and ready for new sod

                                                  The boys laying the new sod on #6

                                                                The finished product           

 I take my hat off to the crew over the past week. They have done a ton of work and have really made these project worthwhile. Now that we have a system down it will be easier to complete more tees in the future in a more efficient manner.

                                     We also mowed today! Cut them @.180 on the JD walkies
                                  

                              I won't tell you who cut this one (#11), but his legs sure are tired...
                                        
                                        

rumors...

Well living on the Island is a funny thing. There is always a connection to be made with someone's parents and usually a rumor to be fueled. The latest rumor we heard down at the Turf Department was that #9 green was dead and that's why we kept the tarp on so long. Well sorry disappoint, (we all know that rumors of bad news are even better) but the green is just fine...

  
  We just kept it on a little longer to experiment with our removal timing. Actually we left this one on about a week to long. Oh well.

                                          Looks a bit better than it did just a bout a month ago!

 Had Paul, Keith, and Logan start today. Its great to have some crew here so we can really get down to business. See you soon.
Paul m

It's like pulling tarps...

                                                                           #5 green

Well we pulled the tarps this week. As I mentioned in the last post it has been a bit of a struggle the last couple of years because of the strange weather patterns and our timing with removing the covers. Well we seem to have avoided that this year. We pulled the tarps off of the greens that had them (3,6,17,11,14,pg had none) and things look great. Just enough growth to get them going, but not enough to be a real issue. The plan for the next while is to let the tarped greens get used to the weather, and  the greens I mentioned earlier will get a tarp for a week or so to let them catch up. Then about two weeks out from opening we will begin to mow and roll to get them in shape for the season.

                                                                         #15 green

                                          This is the back right portion of #5 green. Notice where
                                         the tarp stopped. By the time we open you will not be
                                         able to tell the difference.