Earth Day 2014 at The Bear Trace at Harrison Bay

What better way to celebrate Earth Day 2014 than to spend it with about 50 friends promoting the environmentally sustainable efforts of the golf course industry.  Even though it drizzled from time to time during the day we had a great turnout of TDEC officials, community friends, golf course industry members, equipment manufacturers, and local, state, and national media.  All here to discuss how golf courses can beneficially contribute to the environment.

Before lunch we had time for people to gather, talk, and look at our Jacobsen ECLIPSE 322 electric mowers.  Some, non golf course people, were brave enough to take them out for a spin on the putting green.  All were amazed at how quiet they are and how easy it is to operate them.

After lunch, Deputy Commissioner Brock Hill kicked off the presentations detailing how the Tennessee Golf Trail and Tennessee State Parks contribute to the sustainability of the environment within Tennessee.  He then introduced Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation Commissioner Bob Martineau (pictured) who started his presentation with our department "motto" that "Every day is Earth Day at TDEC".  This is true and we strive everyday to make decisions that best limit our impact on the environment and natural resources.

I was very happy that Dr. Jim Brosnan (pictured), Professor of Plant Sciences at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, was able to speak at our event.  Dr. Brosnan spoke to attendees about the role of golf courses in limiting the use of water by allowing naturalized areas to grow on golf courses and how golf courses can protect the waterways by providing buffer strips around the edge of waterways to filter chemicals and fertilizer runoff.  I was also grateful for Dr. Brandon Horvath and my "old" friend Dr. Tom Samples joined us for the day's event.

Our next speaker was Ron Wright, CGCS, Golf Course Superintendents Association of America Southeast Field Rep.  Mr. Wright has a special insight into how golf courses can contribute to the betterment of the environment because he has been in the golf course industry for over 30 years. Mr. Wright gets to see a multitude of golf courses across the southeast each year and had many great stories to tell about how the golf course industry is turning our reputation around from several years ago of being "environmental polluters".

One of the most special things that happened on Earth Day, in my opinion, was when Mr. Wright, on behalf of GCSAA and the Environmental Institute for Golf, presented Ms. Lori Munkeboe, Director of TDEC's Office of Sustainable Practices, a special Certificate of Recognition for her and her offices work on the Electric Equipment Initiative at The Bear Trace at Harrison Bay.  If it were not for Ms. Munkeboe wondering if there was any electric golf course equipment we could use, this celebration at Harrison Bay probably would not have happened.

The last speaker of the day was Mr. David Withers, Jacobsen Worldwide President.  Mr. Withers has a special passion for the environment that I have not seen from another equipment manufacturer.  Mr. Withers spoke to our guests about how equipment has changed over the years and how Jacobsen has embraced the need and desire of golf course superintendents to provide a high quality product while also limiting the strain on natural resources. Jacobsen's commitment to the environment lead to the creation of the fully electric Eclipse 322 mowers, one of the reasons we were able to reduce our gasoline usage by over 9,000 gallons this past year.

Mr. Withers, Paul Carter, Comm. Bob Martineau

Mr. Withers was also gracious enough to present The Bear Trace at Harrison Bay with our certification from Golf Environment Organization or GEO.  Jacobsen was the first equipment manufacturer to see the benefit of promoting environmental sustainability through GEO, so we were thrilled when Mr. Withers volunteered to present our certification.  Being only one of six golf courses in the United States to garner this exclusive environmental certification and having it be awarded on Earth Day was the icing on the cake.

Wildlife Walk group gathered in front of one of
our Operation Pollinator plantings

After the presentations were complete, and even though it was drizzling a bit, Mitch and Bill took our guests on a little "wildlife walk".  Our guests walked down along #10 fairway were Mitch and Bill showed them our wild turkey feeders, our blue bird houses, our wood duck nesting houses, our mallard duck nesting tubes, and finished it up near the Harrison Bay Eagle Cam nesting tree where Harrison Bay State Park Manager Don Campbell and HBSP Ranger Matt Vawter told the guests about the project and allowed them to look at the eagles through a spotting scope and binoculars.  For several of our guests this was the first time they had seen a bald eagle in the wild and were amazed at how beautiful they really are.

The Earth Day Celebration at The Bear Trace at Harrison Bay presented by Jacobsen was a tremendous success and I think we were able to help educate and inform our guests on how golf courses can be, and are, environmental stewards.



A special thanks goes out everyone who decided to spend the day celebrating with us.  We had many state and local officials, community friends, and media from around the nation join us and we could not be happier.

A very special thanks has to go out to Mr. Adam Slick of Jacobsen for thinking of and coordinating the event. Ms. Sharon and Ms. Amy were terrific in organizing the event and being the smart ones who thought of providing umbrellas which came in very helpful to our guests.  Mr. Glenn Gray of We Are Golf and Buffalo Communications did a great job of coordinating with all the media around the world to make sure the event got the maximum amount of coverage possible.

In case you were not able to attend here are some of the media reports on the event

WDEF Chattanooga CBS affiliate "Earth Day and Eagles..."

CNN.com "A golf club with more eagles than most"


Chattanooga Times Free Press "Bear Trace a fitting site for Earth Day Celebration"

Operation Pollinator Wildflower Plots Established

Another environmental project that we are happy to be involved with at The Bear Trace at Harrison Bay is the Operation Pollinator program supported by Syngenta.  For many years golf courses have been accused, sometimes correctly but many times incorrectly, of damaging or destroying the habitats of natural pollinators such as bees and butterflies.  In an effort to raise the awareness of the need and importance of these pollinators to golf courses, and the world in general, Syngenta began Operation Pollinator in Europe several years ago.  With the overwhelming success of the program in Europe they have begun the program in the US.


We chose two areas on our golf courses, which have already been converted from daily high maintenance to low maintenance naturalized areas, to be used for this project.  These areas are to the left of the first tee complex and between the tenth green and eleven tee complex and will encompass about 15,000 square feet.

The process of preparing the area between 10 and 11 began with mowing down of the naturalized area with our frontdeck mower.

The next step was to blow off the clippings.

The area was then mowed down with a triplex mower down to 1/4" and blown off again.

After mowing the area down we allowed the area to "green" up and then applied RoundUp to the entire area.  After a few days we used our John Deere aerifier to prep the ground pulling 3/4" cores from the ground.  The area was then coated with a layer of sand and drug with a steel drag mat to prepare the soil for planting.

We used 1/2" rebar and flat washers to build rope stakes that we placed around the planting areas.  Hopefully this will let the golfers know that they are not supposed to drive in these areas (but time will tell).

We purchased our wildflower mix from American Meadows and hope that the mix will provide us with many years of native pollinator wildflowers and will most of all provide the native pollinators the food, habitat, and breeding ground that they need to survive and regain their population.

I think this is a great program, and I like the fact that Syngenta is supporting this project without making any money off of it.  I would especially like to thank our Syngenta rep, Jason Whitecliffe, for introducing us to this project and for his support in getting it off the ground.

If you would like information about the project, contact your local Syngenta sales rep or visit http://operationpollinator.com/golf/.

New Practices and Sand Should Make Routine Topdressing Better

In order to get ultradwarf putting greens in the best condition they can be there are many cultural practices that must be done on a routine basis.  These range from double mowing, to vertical mowing, to grooming or brushing, to solid and core aerification, to routine light and heavy topdressing.

Today was our first routine topdressing of our greens for this growing season.  We will be performing this practice every 7-14 days depending on growth of the turfgrass and scheduled play on the golf course.  In the past we have used a dyed green sand but we are trying to provide a better surface while also cutting our operational costs, so we are using a humate enriched sand.

Our new sand is the exact same sand particle we have used for years so we are not in any danger of bridging or changing the structure of our putting surfaces.  This sand from Golf Agronomics is blended with humates from Humate International at a rate of 1000# of humate per truck load.  We routinely apply humates to our greens through our foliar applications to improve the nutrient and water holding capacity of our sand based putting greens.  Adding the humate sand will allow us to provide a long lasting residual supply of humates to the soil over time.

I was very pleased with how well the humate sand spread with our Dakota 410 topdresser and was equally pleased with how our SandPro CocoMat drag mat did at moving the sand into the turfgrass canopy.

A quick mow following the drag to clean up the green surface and remove any "turf tags" that had been pulled up from the drag mat and we were ready for a light application of water to help move additional sand into the surface.

After the minute of water applied the greens are ready for play.  I know many golfers see topdressing as a bad thing but it should be seen as a beneficial process.  Topdressing of greens helps to keep the surface firm, smooth, and provides you with a better ball roll.  Properly topdressed greens will have much less tendency to scalp or become "puffy" or "spongy".  Greens that are properly topdressed will promote more rapid infiltration of irrigation and rain water allowing the golfer to play on the greens quicker and maintenance of the greens to be performed more quickly compared to greens which do not drain properly.

We are always trying to provide our golfing guests with the best possible conditions we can provide.  This winter and lagging spring is causing the golf course to be delayed in green-up and in our normal greens maintenance activities.  As the weather improves so will our activities on the greens and so will the conditions of the greens.

Burning Off Native Areas on the Golf Course

I know that we will have several questions come up about "what happened to the native areas on #1 and #9?"  These areas were burnt off today in a controlled burn process which will rejuvenate these areas with new native grasses, especially the broomsedge which is the plant species we want the most.

This is the area on #1 tee before we began the burn process.

We began the process by spraying a pass around the entire area to be burnt with water using our greens sprayer.

Once the surrounding turfgrass was soaked with water we began the burn at the back end of the area to be burnt.  We used backpack blowers to control the fire and let it burn slowly back into the wind.  This was a slow process but is vitally necessary for a safe and controlled burn process.

Here is a good shot of how the fire is controlled by burning it "back" into itself and controlling how far it can proceed outside of the burn area.

Once the back fire break was established we set the fire on the far side of the area and allowed the wind to do its job.  Once the fire met up with the fire break we had created on the back side there was no more fuel and it simply went out.

This is the area on #1 following the burn process.  It took about an hour to complete and we will continue to renovate this area over the next week or two as we prepare this area for a wild flower bed as part of Syngenta Turf's Operation Pollinator (but that is for another post).

This is a before photo of the area on #9 tee complex which we also burnt off today.  This area will not be planted in wild flowers but I wanted to see how long it took to come back and how well the broomsedge repopulated this area.

This is the area on #9 after burning.  In only a few weeks this area will be green again and full of new native grasses.  At least that is the plan.

The last thing we did before we left the area for the day was to make absolutely sure all of the fire was out, so we ran the irrigation system for about 10 minutes to soak any lingering embers in the area that might have wanted to catch the area on fire again.





This was a dirty, smoky job and I have to give special thanks to Mitch and Willie for doing the majority of the work. Also I want to thank Harrison Bay State Ranger Grant Sherrod for facilitating the burn.

Just a word of precaution if you are going to do a controlled burn.  Make sure you have permission from the Air Control Board in your area.  Make sure the weather conditions are right for a burn and make sure you have adequate help and an adequate water supply to keep the fire under control.  After all it is a "Controlled Burn"

Coco Mat Dragging Made Easy

As with many golf course superintendents we all have certain products and tools that we think are the greatest.  One of the best products on the market, in my humble opinion, is the CocoMat topdressing drag mat.  This mat does a superior job of brushing in topdressing sand but it has one major drawback...it weighs a ton.  I know the weight serves a purpose but it can make it almost impossible to use, or at the least, less desirable.

For several weeks we have been trying to come up with a way to use our CocoMat without running the risk of someone getting an hernia from lifting it.  I think we came up with a good alternative.

We have a Toro SandPro that we no longer use which will serve perfectly for this purpose.  We replaced the normal knobby tires with "slicks" so there would be no tread to damage the greens surface and removed the spring tine rakes that were on it.








Next we built a frame system out of 3" PVC pipe that we had at the golf course maintenance facility, to which the CocoMat was then secured to using 1/2" bolts and eyebolts.

The CocoMat frame was then secured to the SandPro by chains.  It took some time to adjust them and find the right point to place them to get the desired lift for transport and slack for dragging, but we got there.

Drag mat lifted up for transport

Plenty of clearance above the ground for transport

Here is a video of our mechanic, Steve Bloom, trying out the new drag mat.

Changing the tires out to "slicks" will allow us to turn on the greens surface without the fear of damaging it.  Putting the CocoMat on the SandPro will also allow us to quickly transport the mat from green to green and will virtually eliminate the possibility of an employee hurting themselves by lifting the CocoMat to either place it on the green for dragging or lifting it back into the cart when they are done with the green.  Being able to keep the mat on the green during dragging, and not have to take the mat off of the green, will help eliminate the berm of sand that accumulates around the surrounds of the greens when sand is drug from on the green to off the green.  This will help eliminate the "dam" that is sometimes seen on many putting greens which restricts surface water from exiting the front of the green.

This was truly a team effort and that is why I love the guys that work on the golf course maintenance staff at The Bear Trace at Harrison Bay.

Elliott and Eloise Welcome Two New Eaglets

I hope everyone has been keeping up with the activities of the Harrison Bay Eagle Cam Project over the past several months in anticipation of the hatch date.  Well, it is my pleasure to announce that Elliott and Eloise welcomed two new eaglets to the Bear Trace family this past weekend.

Here is a photo of HB5 who was introduced to the world early on Saturday morning.  HB6 followed 24 hours later and was introduced early on Sunday morning.

Thanks to the generous funding by the USGA and The Friends of Harrison Bay State Park, along with our many other donors, we were able to purchase a pan/tilt/zoom camera this year.  Using the PTZ camera we were able to zoom in and watch as HB6 attempted to make its way into the world.

To say that these two little creatures are cute or adorable would be a complete understatement.  It is hard to believe that they will one day be one of the fiercest raptors in the sky, but for now they are just cute, little, fuzzy bobbleheads that are getting attention from viewers all over the world.

We are completely honored and blessed that this pair of majestic birds has chosen our golf course to raise their family and we hope to continue, and improve, the project for many years to come.  We have about 8 weeks to watch them grow before they fledge, and time will fly by.

Please tell your friends, and even your enemies, to come join us in watching Elliott and Eloise teach HB5 and HB6 how to be great American Bald Eagles.

Spring has sprung

After a long difficult winter the golf course is beginning to come to life as the temperatures begin to climb. This past winter has been the toughest since we have had our Champion greens but they look very good coming out of dormancy.  It has especially been good to see the golfers return to the course in large numbers.  This week we scalped down the greens to get the "winter coat" off of them and get them ready for summer.

#10 green after mowing

Willie and Jonathen installing new sod on the irrigation
trench lines

Our major winter project was to install part circle irrigation heads on several of the greens and Willie, Jonathen, and Eric did a great job with this project.  We were able to get ten holes completed this year, which with the weather issues that we had, I am very pleased with.  The final step to this project will be to sod over the trench lines that were created during the process.  We have gotten several of the holes done this week and will continue next week to finish it up.

Newly sodded trench lines which will blend in quickly

This upcoming week, the week of March 10th, should be a very exciting week for us at the course as we are hoping to welcome two new members to the Bear Trace family.  Eloise and Elliott have been tremendous parents this winter keeping their two eggs safe and warm in the bitter cold and snow.  Eloise sat on the two eggs throughout the winter snow storm keeping them from harm.  They are a great pair and we hope and pray the hatching process is successful.  March 11 will mark 35 days since the first egg was laid which is the normal gestation period for American Bald Eagle.  If you have not been watching we hope you will tune into www.harrisonbayeaglecam.org this week to watch the excitement.

Spring has sprung and there will be many more exciting changes and improvements to the golf course this year.  We hope all of you will come out and join us and enjoy our great course and all our hard work.