Stay open or close the course?

Last year I was asked by a friend about the pros and cons on keeping the course open all year.  This is a topic that comes up more frequently as the weather seems to stay better longer in the spring in fall.  (I'm writing this today as it is expected to be 50 degrees in Chicago.)  So is it beneficial to stay open all year?

I have a client, Jester Park, in Des Moines who stays open all year.  They are a public golf course and have been doing this for years, so it must be beneficial to them.  Last winter, due to the mild conditions, I asked them how this helps them out.

First, you need to look at how you are serving your existing clients.  Jester Park is a heavily used golf course that puts through over 35,000 rounds a year on its 18 hole course, and another 12,000 on the par 3 course.  They also run a lot of golf leagues.  These vary from after work and women leagues, to senior leagues.  By having this many leagues, they get a variety of golfers at the course.  This came into mind as I completed a renovation for the course.  I had to keep the course enjoyable, and challenging for all levels of golfers.  And we accomplished this task.

So keeping the golf course open allows these golfers, especially the retired ones, a place to get together.  If they are season pass holders, they may stop by with their group, enjoy some coffee, a few holes of golf, and maybe a beer at the end.  It gives them a place to socialize and they pass this on to their friends.  If they are pay as you play golfers, you get a little additional revenue, but at least they know where they can go to play.  It may only be a day or two a week, but it goes a long way in customer satisfaction.

An added bonus to having your regular golfers show up all winter.  They tend to renew their season passes earlier.  This helps with the cash flow as you spread out the incoming cash from your golfers.  This little bit can go a long way.

Next, you have to look at your competition.  Depending on your market, you need to evaluate what all the other courses are doing.  If nobody is staying open, it might help you out as golfers will seek a place to get some exercise and hit a few golf balls.  This provides you with more word of mouth publicity.  Golfers that may normally play another course may hear through friends that you are open and wander out to the course.  

After completing the renovation, this word of mouth helped spread around the new changes.  Golfers from other courses would play a round or two in the winter months to stay active.  After seeing the course changes, they come back in the summer to play under normal conditions.  Soon they would play a few times a year, then join a league, and now you got another regular golfer.  All this by just having the word spread that you are open year round. 

So what are the cons to staying open.  According the Jester Park last year, there were none.  The staff are salaried employees who would be there each day anyway.  You may have additional wear and tear on the golf course, but this seemed to be nominal.  Most golfers in the winter do it for the exercise.  So they are walking and not taking a cart.  One issue that came up last year was the inability to cut new cups in January and February.  After playing the same hole locations for two months, we wondered how that would affect the greens.  According the grounds staff, there was no significant damage.

So according to this course, the benefits of staying open all year out weigh any potential damage.  Golfers make it out the course more often and come out earlier in the spring as the weather gets better.  And by the number of rounds they do, nobody seems to mind.

Modification of a USGA green.

Existing green

So what do you do when you have a area of a green that needs modification but you don’t want to rebuild the entire green.  If it’s an older soil base green, the modification is easy.  Typically you would lift the sod, make your modification by altering your soil profile to achieve the desired change, and then replace the sod.  After a few months of aerification and topdressing, the green will play the same.

But what do you do if you want to make that same change in a USGA constructed green?  Well, that task is a little more tricky.  I recently completed this type of project at Canyata Golf Club by modifying a mound in the third green.

Sod removed

As you can see by the photos, the green had a mound that, while separating hole locations, was too difficult to putt over and maintain.  Therefore, a plan was proposed to reduce the mound and enlarge a shelf on the left portion of the green.  As I said, this is a USGA green with a 12” mix layer and 4” of gravel.  We could not just lift the sod, flatten the mound, and put the sod back down.  We had to remove the material down to subgrade and modify the subgrade before putting the materials back.  Here’s how it all took place.

Day 1 began by marking out the area to be modified and removing the sod.  This project was completed in October so we had the opportunity to place the sod

Excavation of mix layer

aside and not worry about it dying over construction.  This was completed in the morning and we began excavating the mix layer that afternoon.  The mix was hauled off and stored for reuse.  This not only saved money, but by reusing the existing mix we are able to keep consistency in the green.  This completed day 1.

Day 2 started by removing the gravel layer.  We had to dispose of this layer as the gravel does not come out clean.  It becomes contaminated with mix from above and soil below.  Once the gravel is

Excavation to subgrade and exposed drain tile

removed we could locate the drain tile and make sure these are clean.  That afternoon we worked on modifying the subgrade and creating the finished grade of the new putting surface.  The new gravel layer was installed and the mix was placed in the green.

Day 3 was when it all came together.  The first couple hours of the morning were spent by fine grading the mix.  Once this was complete, at about 10am, the golf course

Placing materials back in the green

crew came in and we began resodding the green.  I worked with the crew by raking out the green prior to sod placement.  This insured a smooth surface.  Once the sod was placed, it was watered in and the area rolled with the green roller.  This was all completed by 4pm that afternoon.  In three days we had modified the green in question.

For the rest of the fall and next spring they will continue to topdress and roll the green. 

Ready for sod

They will also mow the green at a slightly higher height of cut while the sod nits.  Once this happens they will aerify the green a couple times.  Next spring they will begin lowering the height of cut until it matches the rest of the green.

So why did we decide to modify only a portion of the green and not rebuild the entire green?  Since we only modified a quarter of the green, completing it in this fashion is a much easier approach and yields a better completed

Completed modification

product.  Not only is it cheaper and quicker, but you’re not faced with growing in a new green that is going to play differently then the other greens.  Also, this allows for the remainder of the green still be used so we are not taking the green out of play.  By next summer nobody will know that the work was completed.  Except that they will have a much better green without the ugly mound.