January 2010 Monthly Report

GCI magazine

Monthly Greens Committee Report

Presented to The Rim Greens Committee

By

Golf Course Superintendent

Justin C. Ruiz, CGCS

January 2010

Course Condition

Yet again, the golf course was covered with snow from the recent storm that hit The Rim. We had nearly a foot of snow cover the golf course, with a total of 11 inches of precipitation for the week. That is nearly the total amount of rain recorded in 2009.

Projects Completed

This month we completed trimming the plants and bushes around the pro shop, spa, and course bathrooms. We also finished work on #7 drive off, after the bridge. There was a large bump at the cart path’s edge.

Projects in Process

Projects that we are working on right now are as follows:

We are spending all of our time doing course clean up. Large amounts of rain we had last week carried a lot of debris and rock onto the course. We had a couple drains get plugged and we worked on getting those to drain, so the potential of water damage to the turf would be reduced.

We lost a couple of trees on the course. One tree was down on the left side of 16. The other tree was on the left side of 9. The trees were both in the native areas, bordering the holes. Read more.

We are also working on trimming and thinning the bushes on both sides of whole #11. Before the storm hit, the crew finished the pro shop trimming and began to trim #11. Our goal is to get this hole completed during the winter months.

Elk



This month we faced quite a bit of an elk problem. We had chronic problems with the gates on the west side of the fence. The Elk seemed to figure out that the gates were our weakest link. They began just walking up to the gates and pushing through them. With Lane’s re-design of the gates we have yet to have a problem. Click here to see Lane’s solution to our gate problems.



Projects Planned



Future winter projects that we are looking at are as follows:





- Storm Cleanup.



- #11 Fire-wise.



- Walk path and drive off repair.



Divot and Ball Mark Repair Party



The divot and ball mark party, held earlier this month, was a huge success. A big thanks goes to the Paczkowski’s for letting us all meet at their house after our repair party. Read the article in Golf Course Industry Magazine.



Side Notes

Last report, I mentioned that I would be on the cover of Golf Course Industry magazine. Well, here is the magazine in digital format.



I am also getting ready for the Golf Industry Show. I will be going to a water auditing class to hone my skills on irrigation system management, view the latest technology for golf course equipment, and do a presentation to 500+ people on our efforts for water conservation (similar to the case study in last month’s report).



During the month of August The Rim Golf Club will be featured on the Environmental Institute for Golf website. Next month Arizona Golfer News (the paper in the lobby of the pro shop) will feature an article about the work done at The Rim Golf Club.



If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Dan or me.



Justin C. Ruiz, CGCS                                           Dan Devere, CGCS



justinr@therimgolfclub.org                                    ddevere@chaparralpines.org



928.951.3421                                                        928.951.3272

Golf Course Industry Cover Photo Shoot: Part 2

GCI magazine

It is fair to say, without a great membership none of this would have been possible.  They used the members' divot and ballmark repair party as an example in this issue.  I can never say enough about our membership here at The Rim Golf Club.  This is why The Rim Community is ranked as one of the top residential communities in America. 

Golf Course Industry Magazine Cover Photo Shoot

GCI magazine

I spent some of the early morning getting picture taken for the Golf Course Industry Magazine cover for January. I had never been asked to do a cover for a magazine so you can imagine it was exciting. Justine Miller was asked to photograph the cover. Since I was a newbie at the whole camera friendly posing she helped me out quite a bit.

The magazine designer asked for both indoor and outdoor photos. Our first line of business was to find a couple locations on the golf course to complete the outdoor pictures. With the temperatures in the high twenties we found some good views to take the pictures. Both Justine and I were frozen trying to get the perfect shot.

We then made our way inside the clubhouse for some warmer photographs. I found that being a model is very hard. I am very one dimensional when it comes to getting my picture taken. The extent of my modeling career has been at the family get together with a count down to saying "cheese". With the help of Justine maybe I will get some calls from GQ magazine next?

The January issue of Golf Course Industry Magazine will be coming out soon. I am excited to see the selection and what I look like. Hopefully I am not as goofy as I think I am. With that being said I felt like I was going to get some pretty good shots from Justine. I can't say enough about her professionalism and making a tense situation a little easier. Follow her on twitter @JustineMiller, Facebook or look her up on the web http://www.justinemillerphotography.com/.

If you have any questions or comments feel free to contact me.

Justin C. Ruiz, CGCS

justinr@therimgolfclub.org