Pump Station and Pump House Project

This project has been talked about for the past few years.  It was a long process but I am glad that we are under way.  We are installing an irrigation pump station, wet well, in-take pipe and pump house.  Our old pump station was original from 1972 and the wet well was collapsing allowing soil to get into our irrigation system clogging our sprinkler heads.  We first drained the lake by filling our ponds on the course.  As the water level dropped, the irrigation pond split in two and we relocated the fish to the south side of the lake.  We used sand bags to keep as much water in the south side to provide ample room for the fish to swim.  As the ice and snow melted from our last big storm (22 inches of snow) we rented a 4 inch trash pump to remove the rest of the remaining water.  We teamed up with American Golf Construction who will be performing all the necessary work.  They dug out 14 feet of sand stone to install the wet well.  They pulverized the sand stone and they are using it as the back fill around the wet well.

Bird Houses and the Audubon

Ryan Vrooman, Assistant Superintendent, has taken on the daunting task to get Arrowhead Golf Club certified as a Audubon Cooperative Sanuatary Golf Course.  Arrowhead has been a member of the Audubon Internaitonal for the past few years but never ceritfied.  Audubon International's mission:
To work with others to deliver high-quality environmental education and to facilitate the sustainable management of land, water, wildlife, and other natural resources in all places people live, work, and play.
Arrowhead's Turf Care Department strives to be stewards of the environement.  One step is to promote wildlife and habitat management.  Pictured above, Ryan is cleaning out and sanitizing all the bird house we have on property.  This step is done every winter to enhance our bird population. We are building new house which will be spead out throughout the property to attract more Bluebirds.  Some other bird's that you will see on property will be: Red-tailed hawks, Broad-tailed Hummingbirds, Tree Swallows, White Pelicans, Red-winged Blackbirds and Downey Woodpeckers.  These are just a few of what our course has to offer.  Keep checking back in with us to see our progress with the Audubon Society. 

Colorado Weather in January!

 #2 Green

 #16 Beginning Fairway

 #15 Green Hazard

#3 Green

The saying in Colorado is that if you are not happy with the weather, just wait 5 minutes and it will change.  We have not experienced a winter like this one in many years.  Mother nature has not cooperated with us this winter only providing us with very little to no snow cover.  Normally at this time we are still under a few feet of snow.  We have been running water pumps attached to roller bases and utilizing our water tank everyday.  It came to a point in mid January that we could no longer keep up with the remaining melting snow and warm weather.  On January 21st, we decided as a team to charge up the irrigation system to water the uncovered and wind beaten grass.  2 days later we opened up the course to January golf! It was great time seeing avid golfers out there enjoying golf at Arrowhead.  After a hard week of watering, we blew out the irrigation system in time for the first actual snow fall of 2013.  While we did not receive a lot of the snow it is blanketing the grass for the time being. 

#14 Lake Improvements

The turf care department strives to protect the environment, conserve water and to enhance our wildlife presence.  One part of our capital improvement plan was to improve the aesthetics and water quality at the lake.  We joined forces with a local company that will assist us in improving our water quality.  They have taken water samples and based on science, they will be providing a maintenance program that will use beneficial bacteria to help maintain clear water and to reduce any algae accumulations. 

The second part was we needed to remove all of the storm damage and unsafe trees around the pond's edge.  With removing the trees, we will conserve water that would normally be taken up by the trees.  We left many trees standing that were not damaged and left the fallen trees on the ground so we did not disrupt to much of the wildlife habitat. 

This is just one step that we are doing here to help protect the environment.  There are several other projects planned for the near future.  Keep checking back in to see what Team Arrowhead is up too.  

Winter watering

Its been only a few weeks since we blew out the irrigation system and we have only received a dusting of snow over the past 2 months.  To combat the dryness, we are out watering greens and tees and any turf areas we can get.  It is crucial that we keep the crown of the plant hydrated.  We utilize a 500 gallon water tank attached to our tractor and roller bases attached to pumps that draw water out of our ponds.  If we had snow drifts building up due to our snow fence, we utilize our track snow blower to distribute the snow over the grass to keep it covered and hydrated.  I have already done the snow dance (nobody saw me, thanks god) and we are expecting some snow this week. If the meteorologist strikes out again about the storm, we will continue to water as much turf as possible.  If we do not receive any substantial moisture by January, we may have to charge up the irrigation system to water the course.  Nobody especially my Irrigation Technician would like to charge up the irrigation system again.  If we all could do the snow dance, the grass would truly appreciate it

Winter is finally here. It's snow fence time!

Winter finally came!  The golf season was extended a extra month with the abnormal warm weather, but finally the cold weather is here to slow down the golf course.  We adapted to the late season keeping the course open for as long as possible.  With the cold weather arriving, we have winterized the on-course bathrooms, removed all tee markers, ball washers, directions signs and bunker rakes.  As always, we have installed over 1.5 miles of snow fence on the course.  We do not install the snow fence to intentionally affect your golf game.  We install the snow fence to trap snow on the course to help preserve the grass over the harsh winter months.    Being in a high desert climate and a very windy site,  we need to make sure the grass stays covered to avoid any winter dissecation.   The harder we work in the winter months keeping the grass healthy, the better we come out allowing for great condtions in the spring.  Here are a few photos of the snow fence and the local wildlife.

#4 Drain Project

With the golf season slowing down, we were finally able to repair the failing drain line that run underneath the cart path at #4 green.  The original metal pipe was from 1972 and it ran north to south from the marsh in front of #5 tee toward the #4 green pond.  We were able to slip a new PVC pipe inside the existing pipe and we added large rip rap rock to the pond edge.  The rock will help stabilize the side of the hill and this spring we will be replanting fescue around the pond edge.   Here are a few of the before and after pictures.