July 19th

Junior Club July Championship Yesterday

It's Friday and the course is being prepared for another weekend with today being a routine mow and course setup day.

WEATHER CONDITIONS
Yesterday was relatively cloudy for the good part of the morning giving the turf a break from the beating sun.  The high was 30 degrees with moderately high humidity.  Last night it barely dropped below 23 degrees but it looks are though the hot weather is going to break now finally. Today there is a severe thunderstorm watch is in effect. It will be mainly cloudy with 40 percent chance of showers this morning and early this afternoon. A few showers with thunderstorms beginning this afternoon. Risk of a severe thunderstorm. Wind becoming southwest 30 km/h gusting to 50 this morning. High 32. UV index 7 or high. Tonight, a few showers with thunderstorms ending near midnight then mainly cloudy. Wind southwest 30 km/h gusting to 50 becoming light this evening. Low 18 overnight and Saturday's high only expected to rise to 25.

EVENTS
The latest report indicated that the Ladies of MLGCC defeated Windermere in their Interclub match yesterday at the Club!

The July Junior Championships were held yesterday afternoon.  The following are the results of the 9 hole competition:

McCarthy Trophy (Boys 14+) - Andrew Peck (57)
King Trophy (Boys 13 and under) - Chris Willcocks (39)
McCabe Trophy (Girls 14+) - Maddie Liphardt-Cann (46)
Lyon Trophy (Girls 13 and under) - Emma Grant (46)

 A reminder that this Saturday is the Challenge Cup starting with 7:30 tee times.

GOLF CART USAGE
Golf carts are available today for FULL USE.  With the extreme heat and peak season play please be conscious of stress on turf caused by concentrated traffic.  Scatter carts to avoid excessive wear.  Please use cart paths where provided.  Keeping carts on paths on par 3's is a good practice.

COURSE CONDITIONS
Greens - Greens were cut and rolled today. Green speeds are 9.5 feet with high humidity levels.  Yesterday some of the worst part of the section recovering on No. 17 green was hand-dimpled and overseeded with bentgrass to fill in areas where Poa is severely struggling with Velocity knockback and extreme heat.  With weather breaking over the next week or so to more moderate temperatures, we should see some significant rebound of bentgrass establishing in that area.  The re-sodded areas on No. 1, 2 and 10 will be topdressed again today for the second time this week.  Early next week, we will start the process of mowing these areas down towards greens heights, with the rooting by then well established.
 

Gently hand dimpling and bentgrass overseeding was done on No. 17 green yesterday.

Fairways - Were dragged with Fairway Snake rope to remove dew to knock-off plant exudes that contribute to turf disease and help control dollar spot incidence.
Rough - The rough mowers will focus back on green surrounds for the weekend.  The hillside on No. 18 was mowed using the Ventrac demo mower.  It worked well with it's great traction to climb hillside and cut most of the area efficiently greatly reducing labour requirements.


Hillside mowed along No. 18



The Ventrac mower demo was trialed on the hilside on No. 18 to cut severe slope

Bunkers - All greenside bunkers were fan raked this morning.  All fairway bunkers were raked with the Sand Pro mechanical rake.
Ground Under Repair - Treat all new sodded areas IN ROUGH as 'ground under repair'.  No. 18 fairway has been overseeded to recover ice damage.  Treat any bare areas on No. 18 as 'ground under repair'.

Course Etiquette - Please remember to repair ball marks and replace divots.  If carrying your golf bag and using the sand tubes, please use on FAIRWAYS ONLY.  Do not use sand tubes or bottles to fix tee divots!!!  It's the golf course maintenance staff responsibility to repair all tee divots on a periodic basis.  Using the sand and seed mix on tees will deplete your available material for fixing fairway divots prematurely!  We also use a different seed on the tees for shadier conditions and quicker germination.

Hydrovac truck at tennis to flush-out and suck-out debris in basins and drain pipes for driving range.

Driving Range - Yesterday, a hydrovac truck arrived to flush out the basins and remove debris in the pump chamber at the driving range and basins and tennis area.  The pumps had to be removed and reinstalled to complete this process.
The Driving Range remains open for PARTIAL USE ONLY. We ask that you hit only from the stations that are set up, and only at the flagsticks set up (yardages are indicated on the permanent marker). The range will be closed during certain times to hand pick as needed, and for Junior Clinics. Thank you for your understanding during this wet season with high lake levels.  It's been a battle!  With the drier weather the water levels are dropping and ditches are getting lower allowing us to get ahead of the standing water. 

Downy Mildew on Impatiens at Clubhouse

Gardens - Down near the clubhouse, we have had an disease outbreak in some of our shade-loving always dependable impatiens with the disease called downy mildew. It's a relatively new disease within the last year and is uncurable for now. If you had trouble with impatiens last year or this year do not plant impatiens in the same location next year!

Have a great round!