7-31-2022

Good Morning,

This past week the morning temperatures almost felt like the months of Fall.  It was a welcome change from the high temperatures but also short lived.  This week we jump back to near triple digits for a couple of days along with a lot of 90 degree days.  These temperatures make it very difficult to keep the turfgrass in a healthy state.  It also quickly shows the areas where we continue to have irrigation issues.  

Several greens have experienced turf damage from the irrigation issues earlier this summer.  Overall, the greens recovered quite nicely after all of the hand watering and wetting agent applications.  There are some areas that will need to be overseeded later in the month of August.  Number seven green on the NW corner is probably the worst of these areas.  There are also a lot of areas on some of the collars that will need repair as well. 

One of the small positives with high temperatures and drought conditions is the non irrigated areas go dormant in a hurry.  This ends up being less mowing time and labor hours maintaining these areas.  It can also allow your tee shot to roll for an extra 50 yards if you land in the right spot.  It also shows you right where any irrigation issues develop in only a couple of days.

I continue to work on the irrigation system each day.  There are several valves that still need the diaphragm replaced.  These diaphragms get debris trapped inside of them which doesn’t allow the valve to close all the way and water continues to push past the valve and leave a puddle of water next to the irrigation head.  Number 17 and 18 fairways both have a couple of these areas.  I hope to have them fixed this coming week.

This upcoming week I will continue spraying clover and other broadleaf weeds around the golf course.  Spraying conditions are ideal if the wind is minimal, skies are sunny, and temperatures are below 85 degrees.  I will start early in the morning hours and work as long as I can to cover as many acres as possible each day.

The month of August brings a lot of changes to the golf course.  Quite a bit of our staff returns to their teaching positions, we have a lot of golf events scheduled, our golf leagues have a handful of weeks remaining, and the days keep getting shorter.  Currently we are advertising for additional employees for the clubhouse.  Words cannot express how awesome our staff members have done inside and outside this season.  Thank you!

Early July I sprayed the tees, fairways, and green surrounds to control the grub population on the golf course.  The skunks and raccoons can destroy a lot of turf overnight digging for grubs.  The insecticide application should limit the areas where we see damage heading into the month of August.

Yesterday we hosted the annual Greater Smiley Open with 104 golfers participating.  The event had a lot more golfers than expected which caused open golf to be delayed until 3:00 PM.  It was a very busy day with a lot of smiles.  This coming week we have the Phil Oviatt Memorial on Saturday and the Unified Golf Event on Sunday.  

Enjoy the remainder of the weekend.  Please contact me with questions or comments.  I’m always happy to provide additional information if necessary.

Brian C Mohr

Director of Golf Operations

City of Spencer

101 W 5th Street

Spencer Municipal Golf Course

Spencer, Iowa 51301

712-260-5370

www.spencermunigolf.com

7-24-2022

Good Morning,

This past week the maintenance staff was busy with our daily golf course duties.  Daily mowing and string trimming were the agenda items that consumed the majority of our time.  The warmer temperatures have caused us to start working a little bit earlier each morning in order to beat the high temperatures.  Fortunately the temperatures have remained in the 60’s for overnight lows.

The irrigation system continues to be problematic on a nightly basis.  I am constantly monitoring sprinkler heads and making repairs to stations that are not working properly.  I am currently limiting the irrigation for the fairways to a few days during the week.  Greens, tees, and approaches are being irrigated on a nightly basis.  It would definitely be nice to have some rainfall that amounted to something.

We are inching closer and closer to the start of the new school year.  This time of year is very bitter sweet because our clubhouse employees that are teachers or students will soon be done working at the golf course.  I cannot thank them enough for the great job they do each season at The Muni.  They are some of the best people a person could ever meet and we are lucky enough to have them work at the golf course.  

I would like to give a big shout out to all of the clubhouse and maintenance employees at The Muni.  Day in and day out each one of these individuals make a commitment to provide our community with a beautiful golfing experience.  Each one of them takes so much pride in the job they do.  Please take some time to thank them when you swing by the golf course!

This coming week we have all of our golf leagues on the schedule along with open golf.  Next Saturday we will be hosting the annual Smiley Open golf event.  The Smiley Open is always an event we look forward to each year.  A bunch of friends getting together to play some golf and share a bunch of laughs.  It doesn’t get much better than that folks!  There will still be open golf during this time.

Enjoy the remainder of the beautiful weekend.  See ya on the course!

Brian C Mohr

Director of Golf Operations

City of Spencer

101 W 5th Street

Spencer Municipal Golf Course

Spencer, Iowa 51301

712-260-5370

www.spencermunigolf.com

7-17-2022

Good Afternoon,

The past week at The Muni the golf course experienced a lot of turf recovery.  The cooler temperatures along with precipitation from Mother Nature helped all the dry areas around the golf course bounce back very nicely.  There is still some turf damage on several of the collars as well as the back left part of #7 green.  Some of these areas will need to be overseeded this fall.  Overall that golf course has recovered pretty well from all the damage due to irrigation issues.

The rainfall and cooler temperatures were definitely welcomed with open arms.  The well for our irrigation pond had run for 15 days in a row and was not able to keep up with the amount of irrigation water going down on the course every night.  We are limited to 81 acre feet of water pumped from our well from April 1 thru October.  That would be close to 70 days running the well.  The well has run for 20 days so far this season.

I will continue to strongly monitor how much irrigation is applied to the fairways as we move through another heat wave starting tomorrow.  Most of this past week I have only irrigated the greens and tees.  The fairways can definitely manage with a lot less water than greens and tees.  Tonight will be the first fairway irrigation of the week.

Greens were sprayed Thursday morning with a fungicide, foliar fertilizer, insecticide, and wetting agent.  The foliar fertilizer will provide nutrients for the plant over the next ten days.  The fungicide will prevent disease pressure.  The insecticide will help control the presence of cutworms in the greens.  Lastly, the wetting agent will help hold moisture in the soil profile and limit isolated dry areas.

We hosted the JayCees triathlon event yesterday.  There were 67 golfers participating.  They followed their nine hole golf match with corn hole matches and darts.  We will be hosting 84 senior men in the morning.

Enjoy the remainder of this beautiful weekend.  Please get in touch with me if you have any questions or need additional information.

Brian C Mohr

Director of Golf Operations

City of Spencer

101 W 5th Street

Spencer Municipal Golf Course

Spencer, Iowa 51301

712-260-5370

www.spencermunigolf.com

7-10-2022

Good Morning,  

Another busy week is winding down at The Muni.  We had a busy week of open golf along with our scheduled golf leagues.  Yesterday we hosted the 2nd Annual Salute to Veterans golf event with 132 golfers followed by open golf.  This morning we have a couple’s golf event with 88 registered players followed by open golf.  

The rainfall has been a tremendous blessing for the golf course.  Our irrigation pond was getting very low and our well is unable to pump enough water to replace what goes down for irrigation at night.  The tiles emptying into the pond have been running all week and the water level is near full right now.  With many 90 degree temperatures forecasted in the near future we will need irrigation.

With the high temperatures and dry conditions a lot of irrigation water goes down overnight.  The greens have been watered quite a bit each night along with hand watering to help control the dry spots.  With all of the irrigating and rainfall it has left a lot of our sand traps very saturated and some with standing water.  Unfortunately when a lot of irrigation goes down on the greens it also hits the sand traps.  They are slowly starting to dry out.

Staff has been working on day to day maintenance items while we work through the hot weather conditions.  The rough was pretty much to a dormant state prior to all the rainfall.  It is starting to turn a nice shade of green again and requires a lot more mowing.  The maintenance staff has been doing a great job keeping the course groomed.

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The most important task this past week was the application of an insecticide to help control the presence of grubs when we enter the month of August.  I treated the tees, fairways, green surrounds, and some of the rough on Thursday evening.  It was perfect weather conditions to spray….no wind and light rainfall to help water the product into the soil.  I finished spraying at about 10:30 PM. 

 grub control 7-6-22.jpg

This application will help control the grubs developing in early August.  The grubs feed on the roots of the turfgrass just below the surface.  They are noticeable by the light brown lesions in the turf.  Skunks, racoons, and other animals like to feed on the grubs.  These animals can destroy a lot of turf overnight.  There should be limited damage as we move into the month of August.

Our gas containment area was completed this past week.  The street division poured a nice cement pad and walkway at our gas barrels filling area.  The chain link fence was also set up around the area.  A fire extinguisher and spill kit were added to the containment area per OSHA regulations.  The doorway will be padlocked during non working hours.  It’s been a long process that started last fall and we are happy to have it completed.  Special thanks to Public Works for all their help.

Enjoy the remainder of your weekend.  Please reach out if you have questions or would like additional information.  I will see the golf board members Monday evening at 5:00 PM in the clubhouse.

Brian C Mohr

Director of Golf Operations

City of Spencer

101 W 5th Street

Spencer Municipal Golf Course

Spencer, Iowa 51301

712-260-5370

www.spencermunigolf.com

7-3-2022

Good Morning,

It’s been another hot and dry week at The Muni.  The well has been running for a couple of weeks trying to keep our water level up in the irrigation pond.  It takes more than two days to pump the same amount of gallons into the irrigation pond as the course is irrigated each night.  Our pond level is way down and we definitely need some rain.  Fairway irrigation will be limited as we move forward.  

 7-2-22 irrigation pond.jpg

The windy conditions and irrigation issues really wreak havoc on the turfgrass.  Several irrigation heads had issues over the past couple of weeks.  This has left some isolated dry areas on several of the greens.  The irrigation heads have been repaired and we are continuing to hand water these areas with an added wetting agent.  In the picture below you can see how much the wind affects irrigation patterns overnight:

 wind vs. irrigation.jpg

Almost all of our landscaping areas and sand traps were treated for weed control this past week.  There are still a couple of landscaping areas that will be completed this coming week.  Some of the faces of sand traps had weeds or unwanted grasses growing into the sand.  They were sprayed and then string trimmed at the end of the week.  We still need to edge a lot of these traps in the next couple of weeks.

The Street Division was on site to prepare a cement pad at our gas barrel filling station.  This pad will give us a clean area to fill up equipment every day.  Previously the area had standing water and would become muddy.  The last part of the process will be installing the fire extinguisher and hanging the fence back up.

 concrete pad.jpg

Staff has been busy with a lot of our daily maintenance practices every day.  The golf course has been extremely busy each day as well.  It’s been very difficult weather conditions along with the irrigation issues.  We will continue to do all we can each day.  This morning’s view is pretty nice for all the golfers signed up with tee times.  Enjoy the holiday weekend!

 7-3-22 #18.jpg

Brian C Mohr

Director of Golf Operations

City of Spencer

101 W 5th Street

Spencer Municipal Golf Course

Spencer, Iowa 51301

712-260-5370

www.spencermunigolf.com