“Providing compelling playing conditions while sustaining healthy turf and proactive environmental stewardship for the long term viability of the development.”
Golf Course Maintenance Values:
Safety: Focus on safety as the main priority every day to create and maintain a safe work environment
Quality: Hold to the highest standard of consistency and attention to detail with a positive attitude, hungry to achieve our full potential and work harder than anyone else every day.
Fun: Create and maintain an enthusiastic work environment focused on teamwork where employees feel valued and secure.
Efficient: Create and maintain a work environment of precise organization, clear communication, and diligent cleanliness.
Environmental
Building a golf course among one of the few remaining intact ecosystems in the world can be a sensitive and at best difficult proposition. In the planning stages, 3C Developers took every effort possible to develop a property which not only sustained the environment, but enhanced it as well. Working closely with Teton County, the Department for Environmental Quality (DEQ), the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) and a number of outside consultants a comprehensive Natural Resource Management Plan was developed to guide the construction and maintenance protocols into a shining example of proactive environmental stewardship. Over the years we have continued to build on the foundation laid by intelligent construction. Calculated and environmentally safe inputs, careful resource management and waste reduction, smart water use, diligent wildlife observations and enhancements and a strong IPM program for all controlled pests has resulted in a veritable nature preserve…and a golf course runs through it.
Agronomic Practices:
Poa Annua philosophy
The management team has decided it is in the best interest of the Club to take an aggressive stance against allowing Poa annua (Annual Bluegrass) to establish on the golf course. Poa is an aggressive grassy weed that spreads through prolific seed production. It is poorly suited for survival in our climate and is a inferior teeing, hitting and putting surface. If left unchecked or if poorly managed the golf course could be dominated by Poa in less than a decade. A multi-faceted integrated pest management plan was implemented in 2007. Since then we have remained Poa free on greens and allowed less than 1% Poa on fairways, rough and tees. It is important to continue the program diligently every year, since even one season of mismanagement sets our progress back significantly.
Greens and Tees Aerification and Topdressing
Organic matter in the top two inches of the putting surface is the most important factor to manage for healthy, high performance greens. Organic matter, or thatch, can be defined as “an intermingled organic layer of dead and living shoots, stems and roots that develop between the zone of green vegetation and the soil surface” (Beard, 1980). Organic matter affects every aspect of turf performance. How nutrients are utilized by the roots, water movement through the soil, how turf performs under stress, firmness of the green, how approach shots are accepted, green speed and ball roll are all affected by organic matter. Some organic matter is needed. Too much can be deadly. Knowing what is happening under the turf guides management decisions in a quantifiable direction.
We monitor our greens organic matter closely with annual soil testing. Knowing what is happening under the turf guides management decisions in a quantifiable direction. The old adage “the solution to pollution is dilution” holds true when managing organic matter. The best method of controlling excess thatch is dilution with sand topdressing. Light frequent applications of sand crowd out the thatch, maintaining balance of organic matter, pore space and soil particle distribution.
Optimum percent organic is different at every golf course. Based on our location design, growing medium, climate and turf type our sweet spot is 2-4%.
Greens and tees are aerified twice per year. In early summer prior to the onset of summer stress, and again in the early fall when healing conditions and day length are ideal for root growth and recovery. With warm, dry weather, greens and tees can usually be aerified in 2-3 days. In the event of rain, the whole process becomes labor intensive and sometimes must be re-scheduled.
Golf Course Irrigation:
Our irrigation philosophy is to apply the minimum water needed to optimize plant health while achieving a firm and fast golf course. Aesthetics are important, however course playability is the first priority. Daily water needs are calculated using a hi tech portable moisture meter, weather station data of heat, wind, humidity, solar radiation and evapo-transpiration, visual observation of the turf, existing soil moisture, weather forecasts and special events.
“The goal of an honest life is a daily effort to improve on yesterday”
-Zig Ziglar