Tee construction and irrigation at Hampshire Greens

One of the final winter projects that was wrapped up in March at Hampshire Greens was the construction of two new tee boxes on holes #8 and #14.  Par 3 tees get beat up with divots throughout the season, especially the bentgrass ones at this course.  The new tees will provide increased teeing area to distribute divots, as well as adding an additional challenge to our golfers playing the back tees there.

Here is an update from Golf Course Superintendent Teddy Blauvelt, who has done a great job with MCG since 2007 at this property.
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Many people ask, “What does maintenance do in the winter when it’s cold.” My answer is “projects.” Projects are labeled so because they are outside the realm of everyday golf course maintenance work. They are not completed during the golfing season for two main reasons. The first is because the scope of work would severely interfere with the golfer and their round. The second, is well, there is plenty of traditional everyday work to fill each day for the maintenance staff.

March is a busy month which includes getting these winter projects wrapped up, but also later in the month to get ready for the golfing season with routine maintenance. Some winter projects include: Bunker renovations, tee constriction, irrigation installs and upgrades, drainage projects etc… Today we will focus on two projects being completed at Hampshire Greens this winter. Tee additions, to the par three 14th and 8th holes, and an irrigation addition to the right side of 13th hole.

The tee additions, why? Both holes have limited tee space in comparison to the length of tee shot. The addition of championship tee tops will lengthen the holes, relieve traffic stress, help with divot recovery, and create an aesthetically pleasing yet challenging golf shot.

The 14th will be about 155 yds and consistently hold the black, championship tee markers.

We utilized the hillside behind the current 14th tee to simply cut and fill, then shape the new tee top.

The new 8th will be about 205 yds and will be used in rotation with the current championship tee to hold the black markers. 

We needed to add a LOT of soil to build the tee. We used soil from 2 mounds on the seventh hole to build the tee. We did this to alleviate a cart traffic problem created from these mounds on the left side of the hole. We also needed to lower the current blue tee top on the 8th in order for the new tee top to have clear sight to the green. This will also increase area of the blue tee, a win win. Almost a, “3 birds 1 stone deal!” 

Along side the right side rough of the 13th fwy we installed a third irrigation line and sprinkler heads. Currently, the sub-par irrigation system has two rows of irrigation heads. One runs down the left side intermediate/fwy. The second runs down the right/middle of the fwy. This leads to very poor irrigation coverage to the right side of the fwy, especially in the tee shot landing area. By adding a third row of heads we will create a superior playing surface on the right side fwy, relieve labor hours from hand watering, and provide a more efficient way to water.

I hope this helps answer any questions about some of what maintenance does during the "off-season."

Teddy Blauvelt

Golf Course Superintendent

Hampshire Greens Golf Course

Needwood bunker rebuilds

About 3 weeks ago now, Needwood broke ground on some important bunker renovations.  This work will continue as weather allows into late fall and early winter, with the goal of finishing rebuilds of the remaining bunkers on the front 9.  There are 12 bunkers left to rebuild on the main course; others have been completed (or eliminated) over the last couple of winters.

It's ironic how bunkers are a hazard, but there is an expectation for them to be well groomed, well drained, trimmed and proper.  Don't worry, if you fall into this category, you're not alone; this is something that permeates the golf industry, and probably is mostly due to conditioning of golf courses shown on TV for tournaments, where they have many dozens or sometimes hundreds of volunteers to help make things, like the hazards, perfect! 

Much data has been comprised regarding bunker maintenance, and believe it or not, there are courses out there where bunkers require as much as 50% of the entire golf course labor budget!! 

About 4 man-hours of work will get just this one small bunker playable again after being washed out by a storm. Silt has to be manually removed by shovel, new sand added, and all the sand has to be redistributed by machine and finished by hand.  This example is from Falls Road, where there are 59 bunkers.  Repeat the process every time there is a major rain event!!  And yes, this is a HAZARD.  :-)

A large portion of maintenance labor is expended while trying to put bunkers back together after a major storm.  For us, while precipitation amount trends are only very modestly increasing on an annual basis, the frequency of rain days seems to be changing, especially in the summer, where we get most of our monthly rainfall amount from 1 or 2 storms.  What does this mean for bunkers?  More washouts and vastly more intensive work to make them clean and playable again! 

While not all bunkers a ruined to the same degree as in the above picture, there is plenty of work to be done.  The above bunker was not originally constructed with a liner, which would help the water flow underneath the sand to the drain and reduce washouts.   Installing proper drainage lines and installing a roughly 1/2" thick synthetic fabric liner especially on sloped areas, is what we are undertaking at Needwood, along with adding new sand.

Similar projects are occuring at every course in our system over time, and most every off-season as necessary.  This periodic maintenance allows us to be more efficient with our resources and focus on turf-related playing conditions!

Below are some pictures of the process going on at Needwood!

Old bunker sand is pushed into a pile and then buried into a hole inside the bunker.  The excavated soil is essentially "swapped" to the surface and used for creating the new floor of the bunkers.  This eliminates having to haul as much as 20 - 30 tons of sand out of the bunker across the course, and speeds the process.

After the new bottom of the bunker is installed, drain lines are trenched.  One of the big issues with these bunkers at Needwood is that they either completely lacked drainage, or the drainage had failed over time.

With drain lines complete, this bunker is ready for pipe, gravel and liner installation.

Outlet drains are also trenched.

Pipe is installed and trenches are backfilled with pea gravel.

Ready for liner!

Liner is carefully installed in the bunker, using a LOT of sod staples (about one per foot).

Once sod staples are in place, each one gets some Liquid Nails to help hold them in place.  Without this, freeze/thaw and natural minor heaving can allow the staples to work themselves loose.

As liner is installed, thin pieces of plywood also help maintain a proper edge when adding sand later.

Final touches need to be made outside the bunker where some bunker edges are modified.  These spots will be sodded and re-established quickly.

Once the liner is trimmed up, sand is added and distributed throughout the bunker, generally to a 6" depth on bottom and a 4" depth on the sloped areas (less sand makes bunker faces a little firmer to prevent fried-egg lies)

Forward tee construction at Northwest

If you have played Northwest from the forward tees, then you know that some of the teeing areas are not level.  Since this golf course was not originally constructed with forward tees in mind, an area of rough mowed down to tee height and converted to perennial ryegrass has been the norm. .

Superintendent Chris Fernandes and his team have begun taking the most out-of-level teeing areas and building a proper tee box on holes 6, 9, and 18 so far.  And apparently it has been well received, indicated by the hugs he has received from some of our lady golfers there, who are thrilled at the new addition of these tees!

New tees were built closer to cart paths for easier accessibility and reduced turf wear.  Each area was built up with some good local topsoil, and graded to a fine level with hand rakes while using surveying equipment to ensure they are precisely correct.

Sod was stripped off the old tee box and transplanted to the new one, and the new tee boxes were well-rooted and ready for play in as little as one week!

Kudos to those guys for a great job, and some much appreciated work!

stripping sod off new tee location

staking out area to be levelled

a little hand raking after rough grade established

plate tamping the surface

Rough sod outlines the tee box; ready to be grassed!

New tee box ready to go!  This tee box was opened for play in 14 days after some quick rooting of the ryegrass and tall fescue sod.