Scotsdale, Brittany to close in cold weather
Courses to be shut down for winter stretches in January, February
The Bella Vista Property Owners Association’s Golf Joint Advisory Committee voted unanimously to enforce January and February closings for two of its golf courses beginning in 2023.
The Scotsdale and Brittany courses, which feature warm season Bermuda grass greens, were hit hard by alternating stretches of cold and warm weather during the first two months of 2022, keeping maintenance crews scrambling to cover and uncover greens on those courses. The up and down Arkansas weather also wreaked havoc on officials’ efforts to schedule tee times on those courses.
Even though the weather may have been clear and warm one day, crews still needed that day to cover greens when the forecast was calling for bad weather.
“The biggest thing (canceling) will do is to help golf ops and our membership’s aggravation with what we’re going through now where we schedule them and then have to move them and all that,” Scotsdale Superintendent Kyle Soller told the committee during its meeting held Wednesday, March 9, at the Bella Vista Country Club’s boardroom. “I think there will be a lot less turmoil if we just put them somewhere else during those times.”
Soller will have the ability to override the closure if a good stretch of weather appears, but that would mean 10 or more days not requiring covers at a minimum.
Officials would naturally rather have the courses open for play, but Arkansas’ inconsistent winter weather makes it hard to determine how long the greens can remain uncovered, and also makes scheduling tee times a hit and miss proposal.
At Scotsdale, covering all the greens with tarps that are staked into the ground takes 10-12 people and anywhere from five to eight hours of time depending on weather conditions. Uncovering takes about a day and a half.
At Brittany, which is a ninehole course with smaller greens, it takes about six people almost two hours to cover the greens and the same amount of time to uncover them.
Closing will not only keep crews from having to scramble when the weather takes a last-minute turn, but also give them time to take care of maintenance issues on the greens.
“Closing in January and February will make it where we can take our time and not be in such a rush to uncover the greens,” Soller said, “or be in an uncomfortable position to feel like we’re kind of on that borderline to where we could have injury from
cold weather when it happens, and we weren’t expecting it. And we can take a few of the covers off during the day to do some maintenance and then put them back on the same day. On decent days we can do that for all the greens instead of rushing to get (the covers) all off and then two days later rushing to put them all back on.”
Keith Ihms, the director of golf maintenance for the POA, said covering the Bermuda greens “can be a hassle for both golfers and workers,” adding, “It can take up to eight hours and much effort to put covers on to be sure they will stay in place during windy conditions. It also takes a full day to uncover them correctly and properly store them in their protective bag. It is frustrating to see them covered when conditions are nice to play, but the protection they provide is vital to protecting the surface of the greens. Covers protect the crown of the plant from severe frost damage and help to maintain soil temperatures at the growing point of the plant.”
Officials only have to look at how the weather pattern started in 2022 to prove their point, with temperatures fluctuating from the 70s to the 30s in a matter of a day or two.
“The problem that we’re having is that in Arkansas the weather changes very rapidly,” Soller told the committee during its February meeting. If we can close in January and February we can uncover two greens, see what needs to be done for spring maintenance, then get them covered back, which will help us maintain the greens.”