Frost delay...

Looks like about a half hour frost delay this morning... 34 at the shop.

Isn't summer less than a week away....

After an incredible stretch of weather in late May and early June we have returned to more "spring like" conditions for Jackson Hole.  Cooler temps and nearly a 1/2" of rain has softened the course a bit and given us a reprieve on hand watering greens.  With the exception of Sunday morning, 29 degrees, we have avoided any hard freezes.  Our planting around the clubhouse have held up under the cool temperatures and as long as we avoid any mid 20's type temperatures I think our annuals and perennials will make through this cool stretch.  We did have a brief snow shower this morning and the mountains have picked up anywhere from 2-6" above 9K ft.

The mom and calf moose that have set up residence on the course have recently been near #1 green and pump house area.  The mom has been a very protective of her little one, so if you are walking or even driving, keep an eye out as not to surprise them.  We have a busy week with the some large group outings starting this afternoon..luckily they are Wyomingites so the variable weather won't be a surprise to them.

Hope everyone has a great week!

Mom and little one behind #1 green..4-5 weeks old now.

 

Moose calf...

We had a moose born on the golf course this last month.  A member spotted the pair the first time about 2 weeks ago.  I got these pictures yesterday next to #10 tee box.  Hope everyone is having a great start to the season. Course is in great shape.  Happy golfing!!

Mom and new born by #10 tee box.

 

Frost delay....

We had 32 at the course this morning..short delay.  Not sure on the timing..close to 8-8:10.

Frost delay...

Looks like an 8:20 start time this morning.  32 degrees as of 6 AM.

Season is ramping up.....

We are finally into June and normally I would be saying something like.."stay patient, the warm weather will come and things will really start to grow."  This year, however, we have had one of the better stretches of weather we've seen in many years.  Memorial weekend was fantastic with plentiful sunshine and temps in the 70's, the last several have been cool and rainy/snowy.  The weather has definitely helped with the recovery of rough areas and the few greens that had a little ice damage.  Green #5 still continues to grow after seeding, verticutting and sanding pretty consistently over the last several weeks.  The only downside to #5's recovery is that we are seeing consistently busy conditions and with that comes foot traffic and more activity on the green, which will slow recovery somewhat.  That being said we are on our way and will continue to give that green some extra attention.  The course is playing really well right now and I couldn't be more pleased for the first week of June.  Starting today as well we will update this blog in the mornings by6:30 AM if there is frost delay.  If there is nothing on the blog we'll be good to go at our normal start time which is 7:30 right now.

Those of you that live around the course, an update on the water/river situation.  The last several weeks has been a real struggle managing the flows in our ditches around the course.  We had several days last week that the river was flowing at historic rates.  That being said this last weekend the river shifted pretty significantly, flooded the bike path east of the highway and caused our intake to get cut off from the flow.  We spent significant time and money creating a new diversion to re-establish flow from the river.  There is still a lot of snow to melt, however I think we have passed the big push that comes with the early warm up.  Hopefully we will see a nice even run off from here on out? 

On a wildlife note, we had antelope on the golf course yesterday.  I have to say in the 8 or so years I've been here this is first for me on the golf course.  I have seen them in the area, but further north and east in the park sage flats.  A nice addition to our wildlife inventory.

Antelope on #10 green

 

Sunday May 18th

First off, my apologies for not updating this in over a week.  It has been a mad dash to get the course in shape for the coming season. 

The course is coming around really nicely.  We were able to verticut and topdress the greens last week and that helped them so much with respect to quality, ball roll, etc.  They are still a little slow as we are taking our time bringing our height of cut down due to some of the areas that were affected by ice over the winter.  We will be progressively step the heights down starting on Monday and should have speeds closer to were everyone wants them by next weekend.  That being said, the greens are coming along wonderfully, as is the rest of the course.  We will have the bunkers in shape this week as well.  The weather has slowed us down, as it normally does in early May, but we are making really good progress.  There are no "cold" storms in the forecast so we should see progressively better conditions from here on out. 

I want to thank everyone for following our signage and staying away from high traffic areas and green surrounds.  I attached a picture below that illustrates how compaction not only affects conditions during the playing season but the affect is has on winter kill.  It is easy to see on #2 were golfers leave the cart path early, and consistently, how much more damage we sustained from winter kill this last year.  So again, thanks for honoring our directional signage and ropes.



An update on the goose that took over the osprey nest on #11.  This morning the mom kicked the young out of the nest..literally.  The little ones are pretty resilient considering they fell from nearly 30 feet.  I have never seen anything like it!?!  I got some pictures once they were all together on the ground..pretty cute!  Be aware that they may be around the bike path the leads past #11 for a while.