Overseeding & Irrigation

Driving Range Tee Overseeding

After a rainy beginning of the week we were able to overseed the driving range tee on Thursday 11/10/22 as planned. As I mentioned in the previous course update, we are a little late in getting seed down on this tee and it will take some time, likely several weeks, before we can use it again. If we opted not to overseed this tee, we would not be using it again until the Hybrid Bermuda came out of dormancy and filled in voids in the spring. This overseeding will give us the option of using the tee to some extent this winter, however until it is ready we will be on mats. 

We plan to transition out the cool season overseed in the  late spring / early summer months allowing the Hybrid Bermuda base to excel without competition all summer and fall.

GCM spreading seed on the prepared Driving Range tee on Thursday morning 11/10/22.

Sand topdressing on top of the seed

Dragging in the sand topdressing

Supplemental Irrigation Install Begins

I have mentioned on several occasions in our course updates recently about the crucial need for irrigation infrastructure that can irrigate our new Santa Anna Hybrid Bermuda Fairways independently of our new Tall Fescue Rough. We started this week on what will be the long process of this retrofitting our current irrigation system to accomplish this necessity. I'm going to write and talk allot about this process as we proceed, as it is critical to our success moving forward. Until then, a few pictures are worth a thousand words.

The first dirt to be moved in what will be a lengthy endeavor to retrofit our irrigation system with the ability to deliver the very different irrigation needs of our cool season Fescue and warm season Hybrid Bermuda as independently as possible. We started here on the bunker of #8 because it is one of the worst areas on the course where the Fescue adjacent to  the steep banks of the bunker faces orientated to the southwest really struggle in the summer. If we irrigated to meet the demands of the Fescue around the bunker, the Hybrid Bermuda around the area will get soft which is one of the main reasons we changed to Hybrid Bermuda, namely firm playing conditions and water savings. 

Its allot of work to add a dozen or so little pop-up sprinklers to an area, but it will be worth it. Above picture depicts the scale of this work well after layout and trenching. However by Friday you'll hardly be able to tell we were there. Prior to the 2021 renovation we did have small pop-up heads around the bunkers that were removed during construction of the new bunkers last summer. The nature and pace of the project dident allow for these small sprinkler's to be replaced at that time, although we knew we would have to at some point, so here we are. Again this is just the beginning of this retrofit.

 

After trenching and plumbing new irrigation lines it is important to compact the soil so there no settling under the sod. 

Above depicts a trench section that has already been compacted over the new plumbing, fine graded and ready for sod replacement

End result is is a pop-up sprinkler that will add supplemental irrigation to the steep cool season Fescue banks independent of the irrigation heads watering  the adjacent Hybrid Bermuda. The big "golf course" sprinklers that water the large scale areas will still apply  irrigation to these Fescue areas, but these new pop-ups will add extra water to an area that needs extra water. This allows us to reduce the time of  irrigation with the big heads keeping the Hybrid Bermuda drier, firmer and happier, and supplement  extra irrigation where it is needed on these steep cool season Fescue banks with these pop-ups.

Overseeding Tee's

Our teeing surfaces have a base of Santa Anna Hybrid Bermuda on them,  just like the fairways, including the driving range tee. The Hybrid Bermuda growth habits have already started to slow down with the advent of fall and will continue to do so as we transition into winter. Our plan is to never  overseed the fairways as dormant bermuda can be a very good playing surface. We have some things we can do to keep the fairways aesthetically green, however at some point the recovery of divots and growth in general will cease altogether until the hybrid wakes up again in the spring.

The decision to not overseed fairways  is becoming very common on warm season golf courses for a multitude of reasons. But for our tees at Granite Bay, its not really an option, because of the overall size of our teeing areas and the activity they get all winter long. 

The new tees on the golf course were overseeded last year but we did not overseed the driving range tee because of its youth at the time. Last week we overseeded the golf course tees on Monday 10/24/22 which is a little late in the season. However we did not overseed the driving range tee because of Jones Cup the following week on 11/3 through 11/4.

Even though it is even later for the driving range tee, we plan to overseed it this coming week of November 7. Unfortunately, or  fortunately depending how you look at it, we have rain forecasted for  Monday 11/7/22 when we are closed, so will likely not be able to do the work then. Next forecasted clear day is Thursday 11/10 so we will tenitively plan to overseed the tee that morning.

 Bottom line, timing of the driving range tee overseeding will be weather dependent and we will do it at the very next opportunity as time is of the essence. We will communicate through the golf shop morning e-mail the precise morning we plan on doing the overseeding. Range will be closed the morning of overseeding and we will be using mats until the new seed establishes properly which will take a bit longer then if we were to have overseeded in early October. 

Driving range tee picture taken in the morning on 11/3/22. Color is still good but the turf is not recovering from use as the days of fall are much shorter and temperature's are much cooler.

Close-up of the divot patterns which are not recovering. If we have any hope of using the tee this winter we have not choice but to overseed it. And because we are doing the overseeding process late. we likely wont get on it to use  the grass until sometime in December. 

Driving Range Tee Back On Grass

Below is a message from our  Head Golf Professional Michael Nicoletti announcing the re-opening of the grass tee on the driving range. Great graphic as well. It totally makes sense that the new Hybrid Bermuda will recover very quickly with this wear pattern. Thanks Mike!  

Granite Bay Golf Club is happy to announce that we will begin utilizing our new and expanded grass teeing area on the driving range. We will be using the grass range tee Thursday through Sunday beginning this week. We are excited to be able to offer this upgraded practice experience. The driving range will continue regular hours, 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. On days we use the front of the tee, there will be a restriction on the length of shots. Please make sure to observe any signage or distance limitations on these days. We appreciate your support.

When using the driving range, to have it in pristine condition for you as much as possible, please find how to use grass areas in the picture below. Making strips of divots by hitting balls from the back of the previous divot will allow the grass to grow back almost twice as quickly. Please try to remember this when out getting some range time in.  

Driving Range Is Open In This New COVID World

After over 2 months of closure due to COVID-19 concerns and some much needed time off and renovation, the GBGC driving range opened this week on Tuesday 6/2/20. Due to the continued COVID protocols of social distancing that will likely be around for awhile,  we can only open the tee to 50% capacity. Mr. Peabody is working hard on securing funding for some tee expansion at the upper end of the driving range to mitigate some of the demand issues. If he is successful we will be adding 10 or so new bays up there. More to come on that.

Finished Driving Range product. There are now seven total target greens including 3 additional short game targets, and no sand traps to maintain around. 

COVID protocols remain in place on the golf course which eliminate commonly touched items such as sand trap rakes, divot bottles, ball washers ect. Elevated platforms in the bottom of the putting green hole remain for the foreseeable future. We will be installing some practice green target's in the upcoming weeks but no holes will be cut in the practice greens until COVID precautions are relaxed.

Upper practice green with no holes. We have come "cup-less" target poles arriving soon. 

Sand traps rake are still not available for golfers.

We recently upgraded the platform that is required in this new COVID world
from the foam we started with originally. I think all will agree this is a better
option then the bouncy, faded foam.

Driving Range Facelift

In the spirit of not letting a good crisis go to waste while the driving range is closed due to COVID-19 concerns, we are working some driving range improvements. Our initial plan was to aerify and throw some sand and seed at it and be done. But  upon further analysis we wanted to take the proper amount of time and effort to make modifications we feel will be more aesthetically pleasing as well as creating a more functional situation. Below are pictures of progress thus far. 

Here is a nice spring time picture of our range. Not to bad from afar. What you don't know is this range is extremely rough  out there and has allot of operational issues that hinder turf maintenance and retrieval of golf balls. One of the larger issues is we don't shut it down frequently enough for a maintenance  as this COVID situation is forcing us to do  now. Why don't we shut it down more often? Members love hitting balls and taking lessons. The secondary issue is we have too many obstacles to work around when picking balls and doing any kind of maintenance. The third issue is drainage which hampers maintenance and the retrieval of balls as well. The fourth issue is cool season turf for the most part growing in poor soil.

When we first went out on the range to game plan precisely what would make sense to do with a potentially long closure,  the first thing that we agreed to do was to remove the bunkers. I know they add a nice aesthetic to the range but the trade off is extremely worn out turf around them as they have to be avoided with the ball picker and any other maintenance equipment. This causes extreme traffic patterns is areas making it impossible to grow turf. I know you don't see these worn out  areas from the picture above but they are there and they are severe. These areas rapidly turn into mud then balls become smashed into them as tractor tire continue to roll over them creating a  real unsustainable situation.

We got started filling in the bunkers last week to get them ready for sodding on Monday 4/27/20. We plan on substantially increasing the size of the target greens near to previous bunkers by sodding down the slope where to bunkers used to be creating a false front to each target green that will be very visible form the tee. Additionally we plan to add another 2 targets giving us 6 total.

Above Enrique and the GCM crew stripping out the completely worn out center section of the range to prepare it for new sod. We will add a 135 yard (from the mats) target green in this area as well. 

Removing the bunkers are not the only thing we are working on. All of the sprinkler heads needed to be raised and checked and a large % replaced. Additionally depicted above is a drainage inlet (DI)  that has been dug out and will have a perforated riser installed to raise the DI grate. The displaced soil will be replaced with gravel to quickly drain the water that accumulated in areas like this by design and improve overall drainage and softness associated with these areas. 

I'll do an update again after we install the sod.

New Granite Bay Golf Club Clocks

Does Anybody Really Know What time It Is? We should now at Granite Bay Golf Club with the arrival and installation of our new clocks. Time is truly on our side as we now have not just  one, but two new clocks. But wait! They are double sided so we actually have four! Hopefully it will be Good times, not bad times in keeping everything synchronized, time after time.

Installing clocks early Friday 5/31/19 morning

Newly Installed Clock on the Driving Range

Newly Installed Clock on #10 Tee

Golf Course Maintenance Weekly - Day 4 Range Improvements 5/26/16

We pushed right to the end to complete all of the work we planned to complete during the driving range closure the past 4 days. Below are some final pictures of process and completion.

The contractor put their finishing touches on the right hand net installation last evening. This was the main project that necessitated the range closure in the first place. All of the other projects we worked on were ancillary to the main project of the net, but needed to be done and were easier to complete when the range was closed.

Reconfiguration of the irrigation proved to be the most taxing and time consuming.

Once we completed the grass tee irrigation diversion away from the mat pad we had to do the same to the backside of the pad.

We also needed to get the clean driving range mat re-installed but first we needed to install the drainage panels underneath the mat.

These drainage mats assembled pretty easily just with a slight downward kick with the bottom of a shoe.

Reinstalling the clean mats was much easier then removing the dirty waterlogged ones.

We just rolled them out with the help of Kevin and the Kubota Tractor.

First roll reinstall complete.

Second roll chasing or pushing the irrigation effort, depending on one's perspective.

Another item on our scope of work was adding a few rocks for zeroing in yardage with range finder devices. We had a few areas selected for us  so we just needed to find some boulders and plant them.

Planting rocks.

Completed Project Views

Again the right hand net to gather and catch errant range balls before they got out on #18 was the driving force of this project and 4 day closure. Here is a completed view in which the net can be barely seen in this picture which was what we were going for.

View of the left side with three extra range finding targets.

A view from an area that looked like a bomb went off just this morning as evidenced by a picture above. Keeping the artificial mat dry was something that needed to be done. It was allot of work. It won't keep all of the moisture off of the mats but at least irrigation is not triangulated directly over the mat any longer. 

The mat pad now has drainage panels beneath it and the concrete pad has drainage inlets installed as part of the pad. The cleaned mat on top of the  drainage pads feel different underfoot, softer almost like there is a carpet pad of sorts underneath. Likely there will be some settling as there was allot of dirt, algae and grunge in the fibers of this mat. Let's give it some time and then asses.

Thank you for your patience with the four day closure while we completed this project. We had hoped to do this in January or February and not inconvenience you in the prime golfing season but couldn't finagle the capital funds till now. Anyway it's done. I know the mats will be drier to hit off of especially in the morning. I know there will be less range balls out in #18 and when you are hunting for yours when you go left on #18 you will be safer than before the net was there.  You now have a few extra targets to aim at and we all will have a healthier and greener range because of the aerification and fertilizer. And I believe the irrigation and drainage infrastructure improvements will serve us well moving forward. Thanks again for you patience.

Golf Course Maintenance Weekly 5/25/16 - Day 3 Range Improvements

Day 3 of our 2016 Range Improvements brought completion to some of the items listed on our original scope of work.

Drainage Inlets that were installed day 2 were set in concrete today

Core aerification was completed on the entire range but while doing so we encountered a unexpected issue that required attention before going to the next step.

The issue was that the aerifying process dislodged and brought to the surface years of imbedded range balls that needed to be removed prior to breaking up the cores with the verticle mower.

We estimated over 1000 lost balls.

This is what an aerifyer can do to a golf ball.

With the balls removed we can now progress to chopping up the aerification cores with the verticle mower.

After that we can sweep up the debris.

We finished up all the tree pruning we could on Day 3 yet had to reallocate man power to other priorities so we could complete the entire job on time. We could probably do a week or more's worth of tree pruning on the range.

Reconfiguration of all of the irrigation around the synthetic mat concrete pad is proving to be a time consuming process. Here we are filling irrigation line ditches. There is allot of meticulous hand work involved when cutting irrigation lines in existing turf.

Below is the contractor putting the finishing touches on the net install.

We chose an option of using treated 2"X 12"base boards along the bottom of the net like the right hand side netting protect the netting of getting hung up and ripped with the ball picker.

Finished netting up the right hand side. This should gather the vast majority of balls that escape the range and get out into #18.

Day 4 will be our final push. We will finish the irrigation reconfiguration, install drainage panels on the concrete pad and reinstall the flushed  driving range mat. Additionally we will place some more yardage rocks so you can zero in more yardage targets on the range. One more day.