Goose Control

After a long course closure due to weather and frozen conditions in the past weeks, we were finally back on the course Sunday morning for some winter golf.  For those of you who have played since then, you surely noticed that there is a lot of "Goose Debris" around the collections and in the fairways.  With the extremely low temperatures this time of year, the geese that haven't flown south are just looking for any place to land.  When the course is closed like it has been and there are no golfers out there deterring them from landing, The Reserve looks like a 350 acre park to them.  Recently, we lost one of our best weapons in goose control, agricultural fireworks or bird bangers as they're commonly called.  The State Fire Marshall determined that the State Police didn't have the authority to issue agricultural firework permits to golf courses and thus, all permits expired on December 31, 2010.  There will be a bill in the 2011 legislative session that will give authority to the State Police but until it passes we will have to come up with other ways to control geese.  We continue to do our best to scare the geese away but they are very persistent this time of year.  Until conditions permit and we can get our blowers out in the fairways without causing major damage, we will clean -up the debris the best we can. 

In other course news, we have been keeping a close eye on #11 South this winter and have decided that it is in the best interests of the green to switch to a temporary on that hole.  Currently, there is no time line for re-opening the green, but as weather conditions improve we will continue to assess and move forward from there.