From the desk of GCM

A blow against Emerald Ash Borer

If you're a veteran visitor to the blog, you might remember several other posts we've made related to the pest Emerald Ash Borer and the devastating impact its having on ash tree populations in the Midwest, including those on golf courses. Well, the source of that information, a Web site called www.treeresearch.org, has released another video on the topic that we've embedded with this post. It details the success the city of Gross Pointe Farms, Mich. (I loved their movie, by the way) has enjoyed in battling this pest and is part of a broader video series that can be accessed through the www.treeresearch.org Web site.

Three of a kind

When you visit as many golf courses and talk to as many superintendents as our staff does in the course of a year, you're bound to pick up some interesting information. It happened late last week during my visit with Craig Currier and his team at Bethpage State Park on Long Island, which this June will host the 2009 U.S. Open.

A lot of times, though, there just isn't a place in the stories we write for GCM for that information. It's good stuff, but in the long run it doesn't have much to do with anything in particular.

That why I'm welcoming you to "The GCM Three," a feature I just created for the blog while waiting for my flight home to leave Chicago. When the staff of GCM is on the road — or maybe just when I'm on the road; the rest of the team may tell me to take a hike on this one — we'll offer up three unique, fascinating, eye-opening but ultimately useless tidbits of information that we gather during our time visiting you, the dedicated golf course superintendent. They might be about the business, the golf course, agronomy. They might be personal. They might be great stories that otherwise would never see the light of day in this industry.

Myles rides a Rocky Mountain high

About a month ago, I posted a note here about   superintendents rallying to the assistance of colleagues who have family members suffering from serious illlnesses. I thought I'd update you a bit.

One of the featured efforts was a benefit hockey game sponsored by the Rocky Mountain GCSA for six-year-old Myles Krick, who is battling brain cancer that spread to his spine. The March 20 benefit went very well and the gritty Myles, shown here dropping the puck on the opening faceoff, is fighting his way through chemotherapy and radiation treatments, is doing pretty good too.

Myles is the son of Mark and Sarah Krick and the older brother of Ben. Mark is the CGCS at The Homestead Golf Course in Lakewood, Colo.

Interview with Fargo CC superintendent Aaron Porter

Fargo Country Club runs right along the Red River in Fargo. Aaron Porter, an 8-year Superintendent Member of GCSAA, has been the superintendent there for six months.

"I knew when I took the job that there were some flooding problems, but I didn't think we'd see a 500-year flood in my first six months," Porter said. "Especially since they just had a 500-year flood here in 1997."

Porter said that Fargo CC, built in 1896, may have taken a deathblow when the Corps of Engineers and the National Guard began building a dike across the course.

"I was told there would be minimal damage, but then the river kept rising faster... they had 24-hours to build a mile-long dike, so there was no chance they could be non-invasive."

Humvees, front-end loaders, dump trucks carved their way across holes five through nine. Porter said eight holes of Fargo's 27-hole facility have been ruined, including entire greens that have been plowed over. Porter expects the course to lose its clubhouse, maintenance facility, pro shop, golf car storage building, the course and everything that goes with it. He also expects to lose his house, which is on the property. His wife and two children have evacuated to a hotel room in another part of Fargo.

Bobcat gets aggressive protecting home turf

North Dakota is the home of the Bobcat Co., and as you surely know, much of North Dakota is facing record flood conditions. Bobcat is taking the offensive and lending equipment and employees to the effort in areas such as Fargo and Gwinner.

From the press release:

Bobcat Company Staff and Equipment Help Defend Fargo Moorhead Community from Record Flooding

 North Dakota, the home of Bobcat Company, is preparing for major flooding in the eastern part of the state and battling flood conditions in the west and central areas. The Fargo (ND)/Moorhead (MN) area, which is home to the Company’s world headquarters, is working 24 hours a day to fill more than 2 million sandbags and build extensive flood walls to protect the communities in anticipation of a record flood stage of the Red River later this week. Bismarck and Gwinner and their neighboring communities, both homes to Bobcat factories, have been impacted in recent days by overland flooding, washed out roads and near blizzard conditions as well.

Back in black

It's uncanny: On the day I jet off to Long Island for a visit with Craig Currier and the rest of the team at Bethpage State Park for our June preview story on the 2009 U.S. Open, I get not one but two Open-related e-mails in my in-box.

The first details a new partnership between the USGA and something called the World Golf Tour that will give visitors to the official U.S. Open Web site an opportunity to compete in a virtual U.S. Open championship from their own computer. That's right — a virtual U.S. Open.

Seems the World Golf Tour is an outfit that offers a number of online golf games (and after poking fun at them a little here, I went and registered and the games are actually dangerously addictive — you have been warned) and is producing a virtual replica of the Black Course at Bethpage, my destination tomorrow and the host to this year's Open. In essence, beginning May 25, competitors will be able to virtually tee it up on the Black for a tournament that will offer the winner a trip to the 2010 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach.

The science of e-mail

I was recently out of the office for more than a week, marooned (in Texas, no less) without an Internet connection. It sounds like a vacation, but when I got home, hundreds of e-mails are waiting for me, including the ones that say my Inbox is going to explode if I don’t delete everything immediately.

Since I’m the science editor for GCM, I get a lot of interesting e-mail, but much of the information I receive is not worthy of publication in the pages of GCM. On the off chance that some of my e-mail might interest just a few of our blog readers, I thought I’d share just a few of the messages that arrived while I was out.

The first e-mail I noticed was sent by Monique Pilié from Hike for Katreena. After Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, Monique hiked the Appalachian trail to raise money to replace some of the thousands of trees lost in the storm. In November 2007, I had the honor of planting trees in a New Orleans neighborhood with other volunteers, most of whom live in the city. On April 4th of this year, Monique and her crew will be planting almost 400 trees in the Gentilly neighborhood. I wish I could be there to help.

Could Sergio win you a driver?

Some odds and ends that really have nothing to do with your turf, but that I thought you might find interesting...

• GolfSmith.comhas an interesting promotion going on right now regarding their TaylorMade drivers. It's pretty simple: buy a new TaylorMade driver from GolfSmith between now and April 11th, and if Sergio Garcia wins this year's Masters (don't laugh!)... they'll refund you the money on the driver! I know Sergio has his critics (I consider myself a Sergio fan) but I think even critics of Sergio would consider this a cool promotion. And, should Sergio win this year, imagine how much fun it would be to tell your playing partners, after you pull out your shiny new driver, that Sergio Garcia (and GolfSmith) got you this club? Something to keep in mind if you're in need of a new driver (like I am!). You have until April 11th to make the purchase, so I suppose you could even wait to see if he was in contention before you pulled the trigger (the Mastersis scheduled to conclude on Sunday, April 12th).
• There are a lot of us here in Jayhawk land who are giddy to have our reigning champion Kansas

Private status

I spotted recently yet another reminder of how today's economy is affecting golf, this time via an article in the New York Times. Found here, the article talks about some of the incentives private golf clubs are employing to gain members and keep rounds played up even in these trying times. The article quotes some names familiar to GCSAA, including Joe Beditz, president and CEO of the National Golf Foundation, and Dana Garmany, who, in addition to being the chairman and chief executive for Troon Golf, is also a member of the Advisory Council of GCSAA's Environmental Institute for Golf.

Among those incentives, the story mentions clubs that are waiving or discounting initiation fees, allowing annual dues to be paid in installments, raffling off free memberships online and taking a more family-oriented marketing approach. The bright news is the percentage of struggling private clubs remains low. Beditz also painted a relatively sunny picture by estimating that golf rounds will likely be down only 3 to 5 percent this year; a drop that Detroit automakers likely envy.

What is your club, be it private, semiprivate or public, doing to retain and/or attract customers during these economically challenging times? Or are you feeling the pinch of the economic downturn at all?

The madness begins!

  I love March madness.

Pictured, you'll see the ingenuity I had to come up with when I had my sick daughter unexpectedly keep me company during the first round games on Thursday. Evey was sick (still is), I was on vacation. I couldn't tell her no when she wanted to watch her cartoons... after all, she's sick, and anything that kept her from vomiting was A-OK with me.

So I grabbed the upstairs TV and hooked it up on top of the regular TV (yeah, no flat screen for this guy... yet.) Evey's at peace watching Dora the Explorer, I'm in heaven watching my Jayhawks beat North Dakota State in the first round.