Pre-opening Progress Report

After the shockingly warm weather we had in March, April seems bitterly cold. Although we still have to suffer the volatile yo-yo effect that the regional weather exemplifies, the average temperatures are slowly creeping up each week.  Combine that with longer days and increasing soil temperatures, the turf is beginning to show signs of breaking dormancy and before long it’ll be growing full tilt.

On April the first five staff members returned to Oakfield and are hard at work repairing the golf course and prepping for our 50^th Anniversary year.

 Gord Parker one of our trusted equipment operators is returning for his eight year. Gord also worked here in 1969 and 1970 on the grounds crew.

David Eye another of our trusted operators returns for his 5th year.

Tony Dickie, our sprayer technician, also has returned for his fourth year.

Kyle Macdonald, who takes care of the irrigation system, has returned for his fourth year (he's acutally a happy guy, this is just a bad picture)

Stewart King, our horticulturalist and gardener, has started his 25^th year with the golf course this year.

These folks make up our core staff and help to guide the newer staff members in the right direction. We are very happy to have them returning as they work so hard to ensure the season starts off on the right foot.

Our first task this spring was to remove the tarps from the greens and assess the winter’s damage.  Overall the greens have winter very well.  The tarps have once again proven to be assets to the winterization program. If you recall from the tarping program there are thousands of staples to be removed and hundreds of sand bags to be collected.  The tarps are then folded, marked for next year and stored in the old barn. Remember you can click on these to make them bigger.

Folding the tarp on 18.

Ready for storage.

11 green from the left side of the green. This green had two separate tarps on it during the winter. In March when the temp was excessive we took the front tarp off to see how the green would react. Obviously the remaining tarped section turned out better.

14 Green from the fairway. Easy to see where the tarp was.  Note the fellas working on the bunkers.

Number three.

Number twelve from 14 tee. Note the snow fence along the edge of the pond. This is part of operation scarecrow.

After the tarps were cleared away we began the laborious task of repairing the bunkers from this winter’s significant damage. Most of the bunkers suffered in some form or another from the amount of rain that we had in the early winter. Currently we’re just working on the ones that don’t require the liners to be replaced, which we will be working on next.

David Eye adding sand to 14 greenside trap.

Gord Parker smoothing out the sand that Dave had just delivered. Fortunately the ground is still quite dry and we don't have to worry about carring heavy loads around the golf course.

Number 18 bunker before we got to it.

Number 18 bunker afterwards.

We’re also in the process of cutting the greens and fairways during this week.  As of yesterday all of the green had been cut and about half of the fairways. Here are some of the results.

Here Tony Dickie cutting number 2 for the first time, one of the untarped greens.

Number 11 after the first cut.

Most of the greens are still quite soft despite the dry spring we have had. The frost pushes the greens up quite a bit and it takes a few cuts to iron them out again. The dark spots on the greens are the foot prints from the staff walking on the green prior to it being mowed. The impressions from the footprints can't be mowed as closely so they appear darker in colour.

Kyle MacDonald mowing number one green. If you look closely you can see the tire tracks from the blower moving back and forth across the green. The blower is quite light and we were surprised to see how much of a track it made.

The fairway unit cutting Number 14 fairway. 

David Eye cutting number 8 fairway.

Number 18 after the first cut.

Some of the cuttings have arrived and are in the green house.