Welcome New Assistant Nate Ensman!!

I would like to introduce our new 2nd Assistant Superintendent, Nate Ensman.  Nate has worked on my grounds staff for the past 11 years. Nate has an excellent eye for details and is a fantastic operator of our equipment.  Nate was promoted to this position over the winter after Scott Werly moved on after 20 plus years of employment at The Club.  Welcome aboard Nate and below is a message from him to the membership.    

     

Hi, my name is Nate Ensman and I've been working on the grounds department for the last eleven years here at the Traverse City Golf and Country Club. 

Recently, I was promoted to 2nd Assistant Superintendent and couldn't be more excited for what lies ahead. I take great pride in my work and strive to provide high quality golf conditions for our members to enjoy.      

     I've always had passion for the game of golf and feel very fortunate to be involved on a daily basis here at The Club. I gravitate towards golf because of the challenge it consistently provides. Golf also allows you to spend time with family, friends, and good people and times like those I cherish. Being able to provide and maintain high level golf conditions for our members is very rewarding to me and is something I will continue to do with the best of my abilities.

Spring Operations

The stump removals with the root removal and clean up have been a much bigger project than I imaged with us doing it all in house last fall and this spring.  We rented another stump grinder to take another round of surface roots out then the clean up then more topsoil and we'll seed them in late May.  

Left of one fairway, more root removal and we are going around to all of the stumps one last time.  

I attended the all committee meeting this week.  I talked about the condition of the golf course, updated the group on the GCIP turf and Mike Meindertsma also shared his updates on the GCIP from last year and plans starting up again this fall.  

Not that exciting of a topic but we found out after my 30 years that the bathrooms at the grounds facility including the two member bathrooms in the back were not on the township sewer line.  We have a septic tank and field which was pumped.  Sorry for the inconvenience over the last week.  We found the tank about five feet down!

 

I am not sure why but the pine trees have produced a bumper crop of pine cones over the last year.  This is left of 13.

We have had a great irrigation system start up this spring.  We need to finalize all of the irrigation changes from the GCIP last fall in our database and live map still this spring.  The project is over 1/2 was completed.  

 

Checking the New Irrigation Heads and Some Fairway Damage

Last fall we were walking mowing our newly constructed tees.  This is how the I tee on 18 looks after mowing with our riding triplex mower.

All of the transplanted sod looks great.  I moved the I tee forward on the II tee on hole two since the back tee sod hasn't rooted as it was one of the last tees to be sodded.

The morning view out my window Tuesday morning with three deer on the other side of six green.  

It's been a long time since we have had ice damage or crown hydration.  After the first melt, this area was fine and didn't show any damage to the plants.  This photo was taken after that late spring snow storm came through.  Lots of freezing and thawing going on.

After the second melt, this area on three fairway had been damaged mostly likely by crown hydration.  It's when the grass is coming out of dormancy then a cold snap hits and the cells in the plant expand and it kills the cell.

The areas in the fairway that were aerified last fall have green grass growing in them.  No damage to those plants with oxygen in the holes and somewhere for the water to move.  

 

All 18 Holes are Open

The golf course came through the long winter in tremendous condition.  Thank you to all of my teammates for their hard work last fall prepping the golf course and property!

Here is a picture of the 11th green.

Here is the third green.  All of the construction areas and turf are ready for the season.

Be sure to sign up for the Club's Kentucky Derby party.  This display is off the charts cool!

 

Thank You Dan!

A gigantic thank you to our Assistant Superintendent, Dan Spoor, for maintaining the clubhouse and grounds parking lots for the 2 1/2 days the club was closed to members and employees!

Food deliveries were still on their schedules and if he hadn't kept the snow clear for three days, we would have had to call in one of the big loaders to get access for sure.
 

Turf Conditions Before and After the Big Melt and Before the Two Feet of Snow on the Way

Here are the pictures I took on Saturday, March 7, this is 2 green.  I was very worried about the potential of ice damage and crown hydration happening when the much cooler temps were coming later in the week.  Be sure to get through all of the pictures and wait until the see the last picture at the bottom of the blog!

Three green before the upper 60's and the warm winds.

14 green with lots of ice remaining on Saturday.

Wednesday after the warm weather on 14, no ice!

Cool picture of snow shoe tracks from packing down the thin snow.

12 fairway and green.  The 12th green was one of the damaged greens back in 2003/04.

12 green after the melt, same green below.

12 green looking amazing and no snow on 5 green after the melt.

A very normal picture of ice and water on 6 fairway.

17 green sod looking amazing after the melt.

The putting green is looking fantastic.

The new III/IV tee on 10.

Here is the picture of the month so far, 11 green!

 

My Service to GCSAA Continues - Such an Amazing Opportunity!

Such an honor to serve on the GCSAA board of directors as the Secretary Treasurer this year.

Our board of nine serving from all over the country.

To the left is Vice President, Marc Weston, CGCS from Indian Hill CC in Connecticut.  On the right is Greg Jones, CGCS from Champions Run in Nebraska.

It's the GCSAA centennial anniversary in 2026. 

The entrance to our trade show floor.

On the left is Jon Maddern, CGCS, past president and former superintendent at Elk Ridge Golf Course in Atlanta, Michigan.  On the right is John Fulling, CGCS past president and superintendent at Kalamazoo Country Club.