News

Good Morning,

 

Last weekend I started to experience some extreme pain in my left ankle. I had surgery on this left toe in early October. On Monday I went to the Emergency Department at the hospital and discovered I had an infection present. I spent the week trying to figure out how to get everything under control. I'm currently on the right course and hope to have things squared away soon. I'm thankful for the hospital staff for taking great care of me. 

 

This past week the grounds staff completed the majority of the tree pruning around the golf course. They did an excellent job getting all of the trees manicured to an acceptable height while maintaining the integrity of each tree. This maintenance practice helps promote healthy trees, provide our golfers the ability to complete a golf shot from the trees, and allows for ease of maintenance in these areas.

The last tree maintenance task remaining is to remove several dead trees around the property. We continue to lose a small portion of our mature pine trees each season. These trees were planted in the 70's and 80's. They are not native to Iowa and eventually the stress results in disease or pest pressure causing them to succumb. We will be removing these trees next week. 

Our equipment is serviced with oil and filter changes each off season. We also complete or document all repairs needed for each machine prior to the 2025 golf season. The height of cut is set for each reel and all zirks are greased according to the maintenance standards. We will complete this process in the coming week.

 

I have completed my preliminary budget for the 2025-26 fiscal period. I will be meeting with city staff in the coming days to go over these figures. Everything will go to the council at the end of the month.

I have also completed the inventory of the maintenance facility and clubhouse for the 2024 season. I will be meeting with the insurance agent on Tuesday to review these inventories to make sure we have the proper coverage of insurance in all areas.

 

The weather has been beautiful the past couple of days which gives everyone the "itch" to play golf in December. Foot traffic can cause a lot of damage this time of year when golfers want to take advantage of December golf weather. The frost will thaw in the top 0.5" of the soil yet remain frozen below. Foot traffic will leave indentions all over a golf course green as the foot compresses the soft part of the green into the frozen soil. These footprints were on #8 green on 8-23-23 and they were still present in late spring of 2024. Imagine 50 golfers on every green today?