WINTER REPORT?????????????

It’s tough to provide a winter report, when winter really hasn’t even arrived yet!

If we look back to the winter of 2010, by January 13th of that year, we had already been completely encased in ice for over a month. As of today, the only ice on the property is small areas in some of the lowest lying pockets on a couple fairways. These small ice pockets have only been there for slightly over a week.
So there’s really no news to report back to our membership at this point. No news really is good news!
This has been "The winter that wasn’t” so far. The slight fluctuations in temperature from above, to below freezing that might normally cause the turf some grief has been a non issue mainly because the temperature swings have been minor and because we have no snow on the ground to melt and refreeze. At this point we have shovelled a small amount of slush off 3 greens, but we really don’t have anything to worry us…………..at least at this point. Having no snow cover on the turf can be a big problem if we get very cold arctic air and strong winds. But so far we have not had either. Tarps are installed on our greens that are most susceptible to desiccation from these winds if they do ever materialize. Currently we have very little frost in the ground, and providing we don’t get any extreme weather patterns, we should not have any nasty spring surprises. But I’d still like to see below freezing temperatures for the rest of January and all of February along with a good 10cm snow fall!
Some people have asked me what the late arrival of winter means for the spring. Does it mean spring will also be late delaying opening day? Does it mean we are into a warming pattern meaning an early opening and an extremely hot and dry summer? Well if I could accurately predict that I could make a lot of money. We will all just have to wait and see what each week brings us!

On another note the exceptional fall weather allowed us to strip sod off the back left side of the 3rd green last December to re-grade the surface allowing water to naturally flow off the green. As you are well aware, this low spot trapped water and has caused ice damage far too often in this area in the past. The re-grading we did changes the low spot water will flow towards. This low spot used to be on the green, but now everything flows to the cart path so water will not sit on the green as it has in the past.
Water can easily flow off the putting surface, drastically reducing the potential for ice build up. This area will require some “grow in” time in the early part of the 2012 season before it is ready to have pins cut in the location, and putting on the relayed sod will be bumpy until we get some good growing conditions and we can get aggressive with the top dressing required to smooth the area.

The stakes indicate where water tends to pool up. the puddle is the lowest point before our work begins. the objective is to make a slope from the puddle towards the cart path.

The first step is to strip and safely stock pile the sod so it can be reinstalled when we are complete.

Most of the work is now back breaking shoveling and shaping with hand tools. The are we strip of sod is much larger than what we need to change the surface flow, but we must also be able to tie the grades back to existing areas and still have it playable. too steep a slope would not be playable.

It took us about a week to get it to this point where we were starting to smooth and finish the new surface.

We are constantly checking that we have positive flow off the former low spot with a level.

The carefully saved sod froze together and had to be brought into the heated mechanics bay for 3 days to thaw out. A special "thanks" to our equipment manager Scott for working around this inconvenience without so much as a complaint!

Once we had the final grade where we wanted, be began the tedious task of reinstalling sod. each piece of sod has to be carried on a sheet of plywood because of the minimal thatch layer. if we did not use this method the sod would fall apart as we attempted to carry it!

As for the finished product........well you are just going to have to wait until opening day!

Motion Passed

Membership Votes in Favour of selling a maximum of 11 acres of land with proceeds to be used for future capital expenditures:

John Liska, Suzi Snow-Liska, Norm and Helene Ullock all volunteered their time to count the ballots on December 14, 2011.

There was 1 motion to be voted upon and 304 ballots were cast:

The Results are: 297 for the motion and 7 against.

The motion passes.

Thank you to John, Suzi, Norm and Helen for volunteering their time

THE FALL IS A QUIET TIME..............UNLESS YOU WORK IN THE TURF DEPARTMENT!

You might think after the course closes, that all of us in the turf department have it easy, just hanging around until there’s snow to plow off the driveway. Well, after a long season where we feel like we have been running a marathon since the spring, we now have a full out sprint to the finish line ahead of us. True, we do finally get to take weekends off, but the objectives we are racing to complete before the winter shuts us down are a significant challenge to complete on time, on budget, and with the highest of quality. The course furniture has already been brought in from the golf course, inventoried and stored away waiting for a snowy day when we begin our refurbishment process. We have applied our fungicide to all greens, tees and fairways to protect the turf from the potential ravage of disease which can kill turf. The irrigation system, bathrooms and pump houses have been drained, blown out and winterized, as have our sprayers and all equipment.


Dormant fertilizer has been applied to all grass areas. Most of the leaf clean up is behind us with only some “pockets” of leaves still requiring our attention.

A new set of stairs are now installed to the white and yellow tee on the 4th hole. This area still requires some interlock to be installed and surrounds to shape, but the majority of the project is complete. Interlock and curb installation around the black tee at 13 is finished, and we have made good progress installing the same at the 12th green.

Bob and Murray (in fore ground) are our interlock specialists!

We have finished installing about 2000 feet of new drainage with only some clean up and resodding to be finished up. The erosion issue left of the cart path near 3 green has been back filled, and is waiting for the new pipe to be installed.

Back filling at 2 after drainage has gone in.

Repairs have also been done to the problem we had behind 14 green all season due to a crushed and separated drain line.

The surrounds of the front right bunker at both the 2nd and the 9th greens have been stripped, reshaped, and resoded. The roof of the rain shelter by 6 tee has been shored up and awaits its turn in the capital repair process to be completely rebuilt. Tree work has commenced, and some cart path ends have been stripped of sod, levelled out and resodded. The two bridges also wait patiently for their turn at refurbishment.

We have also stripped sod off a high spot on the left side of the 14th green which has trapped water and caused ice damage in past winters. This area will be regraded to allow surface flow off the green drastically reducing standing water in the future. If the weather holds there are other greens which will benefit from the same regrading to get positive surface flow.

And, along with all these items, I have already begun planning for both the operational side and capital plan for the 2012 season.
So, when will I be able to finally slow down, relax and put my feet up?
When we get the first snow fall of course, which will stop any unfinished project in its tracks…………………. Actually, now I think about it, I’ll be here, plowing snow from the driveway and parking lot so our year round staff has safe access to the club house.
I guess I’ll just have to wait for Christmas Morning………when the kids will be at my bedroom door at 5am!

So You Think You're Tough!!!

The Annual SYTYT tournament was held on the final day of the season and we had a great turn out with over 60 players challenging the course.

This cross country event had some interesting holes. The toughest tee shot was probably the one from the 11th fairway (at the top of the gourge) to the 13th fairway. Mmm no maybe the one from the 14th Red tee to the 17th green was the toughest!!

The teams were chosen by a random draw and handicaps were used.

The Toughest of the Tough was Dave Williams, Pat Burrell, Greg Shea and Barney Atam.
2nd Chris Couch, Peter Lambrinos, Bill Fox and Bob Didiuk
3rd Nick Iordanis, Leon Lok, Howard Kirke, Jordan Wheeler
4th Mike Lindsay, Peter Cross, Lester Davies, John Dimopolous
5th Jim McGilton, Tom Hill, John Higginson, Rose Hulme

Congratulations to all and your winnings (cash) is in the Pro Shop.

Remember - winning team gets to design the Course for next years event!!

PRO SHOP SALE

End of the Year Sale Now On!!!

40 % off - Men's Shirts and Shorts
40% off - Women's Tops and Shorts

25% off - Rain and Outerwear

25% off - Shoes

20% off - Golf Bags

Maxfli Glove Blow out - $5

Demo Woods and Iron Sets are Priced to Clear!!

Pinnacle Golf Balls 12 and 15 ball Packs - $15

Canada Wins!

The President's Cup took place on Sunday October 23rd and Team Canada once won the day!

Led by Captain Fred Calvert, the Canadians scored 23 1/2 pts to the World's 16 1/2 pts.

Captain Nello Mariani and partner Joe Dotchin won the Captain's match but it wasn't enough to inspire his Team to greatness!

The Canadian sides of Brad Hewitt and Mike Karl plus Peter Schuch and Wayne Carpenter both won the maximum of 4 points in their matches.

A total of 40 players played in this years Event and it was played in unusually favourable weather conditions!

The weather was great - the Club camera on the other hand was not and this is the only photo that turned out of the Event!!

CLOSING A GOLF COURSE

If you haven't already heard, the golf course is closed all day today (Thursday October 20th) to all play. The rain fell all night adding over an inch and a half to an already saturated golf course. All turf staff were sent home before first light this morning. This is only the second time in my career I can remember making the decision first thing in the morning, to closing a golf club completely for the entire day. The first time we had received a light snow fall over night and the wind blew this snow into small snow drifts in many locations. Member's most certainly could have teed off and walked through or around the drifts had I let them. But power carts would not have been able to drive through the drifts and in many cases you could not find a way around them. So why didn't I let golfers walk? Simply the safety concern. I knew they would walk through some if not many of the drifts, with no way of knowing what footing they might have. They could easily sip and fall. Or if walking across even a minor slope there was the potential to slide down and tear a muscle or ligament, or an even more serious injury. They would also have no way of knowing if the ground below where they were stepping was level. And had we needed to remove an injured member, getting them off the course would have been a big challenge.


Today we do have a bit of a safety issue here at Whitevale, but the bigger reason to close the golf course to all play is to protect the course itself, from the damage it would receive. Even walking on the saturated ground causes more compaction issues than driving a cart because of the psi exerted under your feet. When any type of traffic is placed on wet soil, it actually causes damage to the soil structure. Specifically, it causes the air pores in the soil to be squeezed out, packing the soil closer together.


In order to maintain a healthly stand of turf we need air pours in the soil, its one of the many reasons we must aerify. The weather report for the rest of the day is for continued showers. If that is the case we won't get any firming up of the soil. A decision on when golfers are allowed to resume playing will be made tomorrow morning at the earliest. And if you are hoping to golf tomorrow, and take a cart, I have to tell you it doesn't look good for carts going out tomorrow! Sorry, but it is protecting the investment and our members, and that is always priority 1!

Women’s League Closing

The Women’s League finished off the season with a closing party, attended by 40 players from the various teams. Janet Martinko and Michelle Miles gave out some fun awards:

Highest participation was won by Kandice Brackenbury and Joan Store of the Birdie Babes with 100% participation!


Low Net Average Award was won by Zona Pereira of the Chicks with Sticks (35.71)

Lowest one day Net score was won by Joanne Kajganich of the Birdie Babes


Lowest Proficiency at 20% was “won” by someone on the Chicks with Sticks (I won’t use a name by her initials are KL)

Highest Net score (58) was also won by someone on the Chicks with Sticks (Congratulations PC!)

And finally, the winners of the 2011 Women’s League were the Chicks with Sticks Captained by Lisa Brewer.

Thanks to Janet and Michelle for all of their organization with this league and for the fun prizes. Also thanks to Kandice for the prizes she donated.

I would like to thank all of the women who participated in the league. I for one can’t wait until next year’s league starts up!


Debbie Couch
Club Captain

FOR ME, FALL STARTS ON LABOUR DAY

It might be an understatement to say I'm long over due to make a contribution to the Blog.
Please don't think I have been avoiding it. The Fall is certainly the busiest time of the year for me. Once we lose our students on Labour Day weekend, our staff is almost cut in half, and we still need to attempt to maintain the course to the same conditions we have all summer. We are also doing our best to aerify all greens, tees and fairways. It is also the time I need to prepare both the operations and capital budget for the following season. Throw in the fact my wife and kids expect me to come home and pay them some attention at some point, and I've got myself a pretty full agenda!

The aerification is close to complete. We do have some tees left to do but they are much easier to work on around the play of our membership. Thank you to all members for being patient with the time it takes for the greens to recover and putt somewhat normally, and for playing around all the mess and dust created during the fairway aerification. In case you still haven't heard enough on why we must aerify let me touch quickly on what we are accomplishing by doing this invasive procedure.


TURF CULTIVATION (i.e. aerification) is the answer to many problems.
Carbon dioxide toxin is better released from the soil
Compaction in the soil is alleviated
Disease resistance of turf is improved
Fertilizer applied to the soil is more effectively placed
Heat and drought stress resistance of turf is improved
Organic matter in the soil is removed
Oxygen absorption in the soil is improved
Oxygen movement in the soil is also improved
Root system is deeper, healthier, and revitalized
Seed germination is improved for over–seeded turf
Soil is loosened and easier for roots to penetrate
Thatch decomposition is increased
Water absorption in the soil is improved
Water movement in the soil is also improved

We all know a picture is worth a thousand words.

Just look at how the roots find the hole made through the process and how well they grow, making the turf stand stronger and healthier!

I won't go into detail on the budget preparation other than to say we track all money spent within the turf budget. Be it on labour, fertilizer, dollar spot control, fuel, hazard paint or even toilet paper. Knowing what products will cost, how many of each will will use over a season, how long it takes to complete each job, and how often the jobs are done is how I put together the operations budget for the following year. And it is not a fast process. But the fact that in the eight years I have been here, I have never once been over budget, must mean the time I put into preparing it, is time well invested.

Something you will see next time you are playing is that we have replaced four boards on the bridge on 12 with a steel grate. The wood on both bridges are 12 years old and have begun to rot and must be replaced. We are trying this steel product knowing if we reinstall wood it will need to be ripped up again in another 12 years. This steel base has an anti slip top and we expect it will last 10 times longer than wood. The rubber mat down the center will remain in place to eliminate forcing members to walk on the steel. Our current plan is to replace all wood boards on both bridges with the steel grate top after the course closes this fall.

A rubber gasket between the grate and the bridge will actually make cart traffic quieter as they drive over them next year. The plan is also to remove the asphalt at either end of both bridges and install interlock in order to eliminate the big bump that is felt when driving onto or off of the bridges.

And speaking of driving over bumps............by now you must have noticed we have installed a series of speed bumps on the cart path hill leading down number 4. There has been 6 accidents in which carts have been flipped over because the carts were going too fast down the hill this season. Drivers locked up the breaks trying to slow down causing the carts to spin out. Luckily no serious injuries were caused, but we want to eliminate this issue in the future, so the speed bumps will force all cart traffic to slow to a crawl when decending this hill.

Men's Closing Field Day

It was hard to believe it was the Closing Field day
with the amazing weather we had for the Event!

The winning team Captained by Craig Burrell shot an outstanding score of 58.2. Jim Allen, Darryl Cooper and Pat Burrell rounded out the squad.
Second place was captured by Bob Nebel, Kevin Huestis, Al Kershaw and Dale Struthers. Their score of 58.1 narrowly edged out the team of Kevin Hughes, Tom Duckworth, Glen Shaw and Tim Charlton who posted a 58.125.

Congratulations to one of our Pro's - Kevan Goble. He had a Hole in One on Sunday afternoon on the 12th Hole. Fun for Kevan to do it with his son Aidan playing in the group! The other witnesses were Jamie and Dave Denysek.