The maintenance team is going to do a better job of communicating with our golfers via Twitter. In an attempt to improve our day to day communications with golfers about course conditions, we will be utilizing Twitter more often. Course closures, cart path only, as well as other important course maintenance information will be posted on Twitter. You can follow us at @sycamoreridgekc.
Things were challenging for everyone in 2020. I thought about blogging on the difficulties that the year has thrust upon us. After thinking about it, I realized that looking back would not do any good. I want to keep it simple following this year that has been everything but simple.
I sincerely hope that each and everyone of you has a wonderful 2021.
As the image above demonstrates, the cart path at Sycamore Ridge is wide enough for two carts to pass while keeping all eight tires on the path. This knowledge is going to become very important over the next few months. As most of you know, the majority of courses in the Kansas City golf market have zoysia grass tees and fairways. The zoysia goes dormant and brown in the winter months. When this happens, most courses restrict cart traffic to the path to help protect the grass. Creeping bentgrass, the primary grass in the fairways at Sycamore Ridge, as well as fescue, and bluegrass, are only different in the fact that they do not turn as brown as zoysia when they go dormant. All grasses, in this region, stop growing during the winter months and go dormant. Because of this, management at Sycamore Ridge has decided to restrict carts to the path only for the next few months. The desired goal for this move is to prevent additional damage to the traffic stressed areas throughout the course. This sacrifice will create better playing conditions around the course in the spring.
This time of year, we also begin removing some tees from the course. The black and yellow tee markers will be removed soon. If you normally play from either of these tee boxes, feel free to continue doing so. We are removing the tee markers to reduce the time spent on maintenance moving tees through the winter months, and keep the markers from killing any grass underneath them.
A significant amount of sod was installed on the course last month. It is rooting down nicely, and should look great in the spring. I really appreciate the care that you have taken to keep traffic off of these sodded areas, this will pay dividends in the long run.
The maintenance staff is looking forward to a very productive winter with more irrigation installation, several tees will be enlarged, tree removal, and brush clearing, all of this is being done to provide you with the best playing conditions.
Today is October 2nd, and the course had its firs frost delay this morning. This has to be as early a frost as I can remember in my years as a golf course superintendent. This creates a perfect opportunity to once again discuss why we delay play when we have frost on the grass. It really is quite simple, when there is frost on a blade of grass, and you apply traffic to that grass, the edges of the frost will puncture the cell wall of the grass and kill all of the cells. If the crown of the grass is punctured, the entire plant will die.
As we get to November, we will shift our stating tee to number ten everyday. The back nine always becomes ready to play much faster than the front nine. The sun exposure is much quicker on the back nine, plus the lower elevation on the front nine are the reasons for this. The colder morning will require that we move our first tee time later to minimize delays caused by the frost. We do all of this to prevent damage to the grass that can happen as easily as someone walking on it.
We do everything we can to minimize your inconvenience as golfers, and realize that your time is valuable. So please know that we will always get you on the course as soon as it is safe for the grass.
