Whaddya do all winter???

What do you do all winter?  Well, we do a lot with a little help.  This winter our staff totals 5.

We are not in the Caribbean, though we certainly would like to be.  (Maybe for a week at some point...maybe not) 

On staff besides me is our Assistant, Phil - Mechanic, Pat - Foreman - Lisandro, and Senior Staffer - Miguel.

Here is a small portion of the list of things that we need to do over winter:



My new plates...dedication or crazy? Probably both!



Blow out the irrigation system, root prune, tree work, bring in every single accessory from the course, make repairs...paint, every single accessory from the course, vinyl guard the trap rakes, vinyl guard the flagsticks, verti drain all tees and greens, topdress tees and greens, verti drain fwys until the ground is frozen, try to get some projects done,  pressure wash every piece of equipment, make repairs and service every piece of equipment, chase the geese off the course 5 or 6 times a day, prepare budgets and fight for them, plow and snow blow the snow if there is some, help Bob with Christmas decorations - putting them up and taking them down, sand and seal the benches, keep the grounds at the clubhouse clean, treat the golf course for winter diseases, repair the fences that the neighborhood folks tear to the ground to go sleigh riding, make repairs to the greens that the neighborhood folks ruin while sleigh riding, yeah....just try to keep them off the course - i've been cursed at, spit at, and the best was a high school field trip that actually came in a bus to sleigh ride on #3 green and after calling the school and the cops....getting nowhere, because one of the folks sleigh riding was a cop and he told me to go F myself, because he's been sleigh riding here since he was a kid and wasnt about to stop now, should I continue....ok, sharpening all the reels and bedknives, cleaning the shops, winterizing the sprayers, split and stack wood when its too cold to do other work, ok anyway i think you get the idea.  Seeing we got a snow storm on saturday, i had to reach a bit for this weeks update...nonetheless there is no slacking off around here.

On the enjoyment side I coach an AAU U-14 Long Island Lightning Basketball team, which had 2 Championships under its belt during our 1st season, season 2 about to get under way this February.  Looking for 2 "bigs" if anybody has a 6'5" or bigger freshman looking to play - pleeeeeeease let me know.  Also, following my son Nick through the HS hoop curcuit. Currently Nick, a Smithtown West freshman - who worked here this past summer, is leading the 8-2 JV team with 18ppg avg.  He also plays for another AAU team (Team Express) which should be headed to the Nationals this summer in Orlando. 

Also must mention, I'll be rooting for my Patriots vs most of your Giants.  (Remember, I am from Massachusetts and am passionately attached to my NewEngland sports teams, we suffered for many many many many years and I will enjoy the good times while painfully enduring the not quite so good times)  this Superbowl is going to be a lot of fun!  I hope......

thanks again for tuning in.......

if you haven't checked it out, for the best eat at home food available...please do

www.myrastellidirect.com/roxpaq   huge sale on Porterhouse steaks, had them over the weekend. OMG, so good!

    

Thanks for tuning in, this is winter update #2  1/17/12  JohnnyP

Very exciting to be able to get so much done over the past few weeks.   Got some great news from our owners who approved the beginning of a proper greens drainage program!!!  We will be hiring Golf Preservations Inc, a greens drainage company based in Pinesville Kentucky.  They have done some great work all over the USA and here on LI they have drained greens at Deepdale, Fresh Meadows, Huntington CC and the Cresent Club, as well as the Creek.  We will start our program doing 4 greens the first year and trying to continue at that pace until they are all properly draining. Trying to set dates this week, will let you know when we are confirmed.                   

             The 3 most important things on a golf course:
              1). Drainage,  2). Drainage and..... 3).Drainage. 

We've had our tree company (Norse Tree) here this past week cleaning up some work too big for us to do in house. Next time you step on 17 tee, you will notice that the a lot of the clutter has been removed.  Very little air circulation or sunlight was seen by that tee.  Also extreme competition for water from nearby trees made it hard for that tee to survive.  And just as importantly, golfers no longer need to "thread the needle" when hitting a tee shot, more specifically those playing the championship tees.  While still a very demanding tee shot, it is now a fair tee shot.

(Anyone need a good tree guy? Erik @ Norse is excellent (473-TREE) and tell him you got his name from me)

The 9th tee has also had tree work done on it, removing a few very large trees from the right side of the tee.  By doing so we should be able to re-align the tee so it faces the center of the fairway and not the right side of the fairway and a huge bonus to that project is that #2 could possibly be played from #9 Gold tee!  This photo on the right is that view of #2 from #9 Gold tee >>>>>>>>>>

Also, our staff has done an incredible cleanup of all the brush on the left of 14th tees.  Years of overgrown brush had made that narrow passage not only ugly to look at but certainly unplayable.  This spring, we will make a few non- selective herbicide applications to make sure weeds will not grow there, and then hydroseed the bank with a blend of Fescues. 

 

Those of you who may not have been here after the first of November will notice that the valley of the 2nd green has been raised by 18".  This will allow for many new pin placements in the middle section.  We also added extensive drainage to that section of the Biarittz green and now it is firm and dry.  The work done is what was approved by the owners to alleviate some of the concerns about that extreme green. >>>>>>>>>>>

Also, We have a mountain of nice clean woodchips in the club parking lot. If anyone wants some, bring a truck and we will load them for you. 

 just call my office 757-0555. 

and....seeing this is my blog and not an official IHCC product.

Please check out my wife's website for some great deals on the

absolute best Steaks available, you'll be glad you did! 

 www.myrastellidirect.com/roxpaq 

thanks, stay tuned......

Winter Work at IHCC

Lots of action from our reduced maintenance staff this winter, as mother nature has been very accommodating.  We have done extensive root pruning where damage from tree roots is occurring.  We were able to access a trenching machine with which we have been able to root prune many areas.  Normally this would be done with the pipe pulling blade, leaving just a small slit.  But, roots were so thick in most areas that we had to use the trencher to power through them.  As you will see from the photos, the roots were so heavily massed that it has been very difficult to grow quality turf because the tree roots could easily out compete the grass roots for water and nutrients.  Our arborist explained tree rooting to me this way; " turn a tree upside down, and double the size - that's how far the roots can reach".

Extensive tree work is now underway.  At the club we have thousands of trees, many of which are injured, damaged, broken, or just over grown for their current position.  On a private golf course where quality turf is a necessity, often trees are doing more harm than good.  We try our best to have the best of both worlds, but turf comes first and we are taking strides to improve

wherever possible.  

We have removed a number of Black Cherry trees that were on the right edge of #9 fairway.  These trees restricted cart traffic and their roots made it nearly impossible to keep the hill alive during summer months.  We intend to widen the fairway in the landing zone and have pruned the 3 remaining trees to insure their health.  We will be having the stumps removed to stretch the fairway and will be adding nearly a dozen Red Cedar trees between 16 tee and 9 fairway to provide separation of the 2 holes. 

Stay tuned......