Finalizing bunker sand additions

It took us longer than expected, but last week we were finally able to finish up our work on the greenside bunkers. Snow and freezing temperatures through January and much of February slowed our progress, but some spring-like temperatures in March helped us wrap up.

Starting all the way back in November, we began refilling greenside bunkers with fresh sand. Over time, sand is lost in many ways- golfers blast it out, backpack blowers and wind blow it out, and anytime we must clean silt out after a storm, some sand is removed also. With all this removal, sand must be added back in to the bunkers to keep a consistent, playable depth. Last year we completed the fairway bunkers, and this year we tackled the greenside bunkers.

The process of adding the sand is straight forward- carts with larger capacity beds haul load after load of sand to the bunkers, dump it, and go for more. Meanwhile, we have staff in the bunkers spreading the piles with shovels to evenly distribute the new sand. Next, after spreading the new sand out, we circle back through the bunkers and give them a much more detailed leveling. We work to ensure the sand is smooth and the bottoms of the bunkers are flat, as they were designed. Finally, our last step, and one of the most important, is to compact the new sand so that it plays firm. We used 4 walking plate tampers and worked our way through every bunker. A new wrinkle that was required this year versus last year is that we also had to water the sand down before we could compact it. With the low humidity and strong winds that have seemed constant this late winter, the sand would not pack well enough. In fact, the wind was so strong, and sand so dry, the wind was blowing the new sand right out of the bunkers. So, we used hoses and doused the sand heavily just ahead of the tampers.

Now, the bunkers are back in playing shape and ready for the season. Thank you for your patience while we worked to get the sand added, spread and compacted. Because we were behind schedule, we focused on getting all the sand into the bunkers before it was smoothed and compacted. Without the lost time due to weather over the winter, we would have had the bunkers completed prior to the start of the golf handicap reporting season. But we completed the work as quickly as possible, and luckily had it done before the Icebreaker!

 

Etiquette Reminder of the Month

Please don't start off 10 tee without permission from the Golf Pro Shop.

Also, as part of a Golf Committee initiative to improve course etiquette, we have included links to videos teaching proper on course etiquette. Please take a moment to watch:

Ball Marks - How to properly repair

Golf Cart tips

 

 

See you on the course!

Joe

jvillegas@bwrc.org