11-13-16

Good Morning,

It has been beautiful fall weather with plenty of sunshine and not a lot of wind.  Very odd weather for fall days in iowa.  It has allowed the golf season to extend later than I expected.  The clubhouse, however, has closed for the season.  The amount of play has almost exclusively been pass holders.  The last day i worked in the clubhouse revenues totaled $16 for the entire day.  So, the golf course is still available and sheds are opened every morning.

Our revenues are down from the same time period in 2015 and expenses have risen.  The rise in expenses is mainly due to the additional pay period added to July and the pumphouse repair expenses.  We are still in good financial shape as the budget heads into the off season.

We have worked on tree pruning and fall clean up around the golf course.  Also, the amenity items have all been removed from the course, except for the flagsticks.  Trees and shrubs have continued to be watered every other day to keep them satisfied in the days leading up to the cold season.  Lots of small projects have been completed.

I have spent a lot of time working on equipment inventory and logging maintenance information.  Maintenance schedules are recorded including oil changes and filters.  I also track the amount of hours accumulated on every piece of equipment each year.  This information helps give an idea what the life cycle will be of each piece of mowing equipment.

The most interesting part of these recordings is the amount of hours spent on the rough mower during years of plentiful rainfall.  The past three years, the rough unit has added 700 hours, 800 hours, and 750 hours on the meter.  The years when the rough goes dormant the rough unit has 60% the hours.

We added another used rough unit to the fleet, this fall, so it will help spread the hours accumulated and allow us to better maintain the course.  There is also discussion to add a trade in mower, from the Park Department, to help us manage the additional property, outside of the golf course, we maintain.

Lastly, the irrigation permit, through the Iowa DNR, allows me to use 121.5 acre feet of water from April 1 through October 31.  We are nowhere near that amount of water used for the season.  A special permit is required for further water use beyond this time frame unless less than 25,000 gallons of water is used in a 24 hour period.  So, I am lightly watering the greens and tees each night to stay under this gallon limit.  The irrigation system will be winterized this coming week.

That concludes another week at the golf course.