Fall activities at Rolling Meadows

Happy Thanksgiving! As of today 18 holes are still open for play but the end is near as we enter the last week of November. It has been a year of ups and downs in the weather with an early opening followed by a cold wet spring, a wet and mild summer followed by a cold September, a warm October and what has to be the coldest November ever. Oddly October was very warm with beautiful but it rained 7 out of the 8 weekend days. What will December and the winter bring for the Badger State? I guess we will just have to wait and find out.

Thank you for your business and support this year and I hope you enjoyed the course. One of the highlights included planting 69 trees throughout the course to replace some of the ash that have been removed. Thank you for all those who donated specific trees or money towards the trees.

Our fall work including mowing much more than average due to the warm October weather, our other time was concentrated on putting the golf course to sleep and getting ready for winter. Some of our fall activities included:

Leaves – Leave cleanup is a major part of fall operations. This year many of the maple trees leaves have hung on much longer than normal extending the leaf removal season. I have heard different explanations as to why the leaves were on so long but all of them tied to the weather and ample moisture we had all year. The past 3 years we have averaged 340 labor hours blowing and mulching leaves to keep the course playable for the fall season.

Leaves are generally blown from the greens tees and fairways and mulched into the rough. 

Patio – A year ago we removed the wooden deck on the south side of the clubhouse because the boards needed replacement and provide a better staging area for the cart fleet. This year we took the second step with the project and installed a patio on the South East side of the clubhouse near the putting green for your enjoyment. There is seating for 44 and the walk to the bar area is more convenient than the old deck.

14 Bunker – Sometimes it is better to cut your losses and move on as is the case with hole 14 greenside bunker. We rebuilt the bunker 12 years ago and it performed better for a few years but it is just in the wrong place. The entire green drains into the bunker washing out the sand and mixing it with the clay subsoil each time it rains. The mixed sand/clay creates a hard pan on the lower bunker and the sand that is pushed up after every storm is soft and provided fried egg lies on the slope of the bunker.

The current bunker is 2,960 ft² . After the work most of the bunker will be removed with a small portion of the bunker (approx. 350 ft²) remaining as a visual aid to the hole more than a hazard to catch balls. Our other goal to improve the hole is to keep the reeds on the edge of the pond mechanically cut down do improve the view of the green from the fairway.

With the reeds cut and the bunker removed the hole has a new look.
This change should be well received by customers who would carry the pond
and then have their ball plug in the bunker face. 

The large bunker will be replaced with grass swails and a small bunker.

14 Silver Tee – Along with the bunker project we are installing the long talked about silver tee behind the current silver/red tee on hole 14. The base material has been hauled in and shaped and will be allowed to settle over the winter. The tee was needed to reduce problems during match play when a male receives a stroke while playing a female from the same tee surface.

A golf course is rated with two handicaps, male and female. Hole 14 is odd in that 3 “mens” tees have a forced carry over the marsh and 1 (the silver) does not.

The additional tee will not fully equal the playing field in match play but it will help. We did look at adding a tee over the marsh but the location of the bridge and the worry errant shots from hole 13 could hit a forward silver tee the new location behind the red tee is the best option.

Irrigation – The irrigation system is tuned up, the heads are all trimmed around and the water is blown out of the pipes hooking up a large air compressor to the system. This two day process helps ensure pipes do not shatter from water freezing in them.  

Blowing water out of the lines on hole 20.

As we move into the last week of November we hope to:

• Remove some more dying ash trees on the practice hole, hole 16, 17 and 20.  
• Mow rough one more time to shorten it for winter. Normally we are done mowing by this time of year but this year the rough just kept growing with the warm temperatures in October. 
• Put a layer of sand topdressing on the greens to protect them from winter winds and provide the benefits of a normal topdressing of smoothing the surface and diluting thatch. Here is a story from the United States Golf Association regarding the benefits of fall topdressing. 

  

  8 Green covered with sand topdressing.

Thank you again for your business and support. Feel free to contact us if you have any questions or comments and we look forward to seeing you in the spring.