Be aggressive!

To combat winter weather from damaging the A1/A4 bentgrass, Glenwild Country Club takes an aggressive approach with its 137,000 square feet of greens.

Located in the valleys of Utah’s Wasatch Mountains, the course prepares for the winter weather to protect its bentgrass, says superintendent Eric Feldhusen.

“We usually get snow cover, but we can also get rain that creates ice layers and ice damage for us,” he adds. “So, the winter is the most challenging for us. If we can’t control it, we have to work around it.”

“It’s getting them ramped up, ready to go and then put them to bed in a good condition in a short season,” Feldhusen says.

The course’s short season starts around May or June and lasts for about five to six months, depending on the weather. To prepare for the winter, they raise the heights of cuts in October.

“We topdress more aggressively to create a layer around that crown to protect them,” Feldhusen says. “Then the last week we’ll actually start aerifiying them and needle tining them to let them drain better over the course of the wintertime.”

Course maintenance during the season, Feldhusen says, is “aggressive grooming” with topdressing, applying growth regulators every two weeks, mowing every other day with triplex and daily rolling.

To provide consistent greens, Feldhusen and his team use the USGA's GS3 Ball and DEACON app to determine the course’s firmness, trueness and smoothness. The staff also measures moisture content and speeds daily.

“Just making sure they’re consistent for the players, for the membership,” he says. “It’s sort of a short season, we want them to have the best experience, and we do consistency by using the GS3 Ball.”

With its high mountain altitude of 6,500 feet, the bentgrass doesn’t experience many disease pressures, other than pink and gray snow mold, on which the course sprays preventative fungicides to control. One of the biggest environmental stresses comes from neighboring wildlife.

The Wasatch Mountains are home to a herd of 200 elk. The large critters damage the course with their hoof prints. To prevent destruction, the course installs an electric fence no later than Labor Day each year.

“When you have an 800- to 1,200-pound animal running across your greens, dancing, having fun ... it can cause a lot of damage,” he says.

Feldhusen utilizes conversations with members and their feedback to help make decisions for the course.

“I think the textbook is great for college, but the environmental stress is the things that you don’t learn, and the feedback from golfers is important,” Feldhusen says. “They’re your customers, whether it’s public, daily fee or a private club like us.”

- Adriana Gasiewski