The Big Dig and The Big Push

The "Big Push" continues on the 16th hole. The entire hillside that the old white/red tee sat on is being pushed into the ravine and back to the blue tee. This D-8 Cat has been working on this area for over a week. The end product should provide good sight lines to the fairway from the back tees.

View from the cart path by the blue tee.

View from the right rough on the 14th hole.

Looking back towards the 16 blue tee.

The "Big Dig" started this week on the 12th hole as excavation of the irrigation pond began. 20,000 cubic yards of material will be removed from this water feature. It will hold 7-10 days worth of irrigation water and will be lined with a PVC liner to prevent leaking.

A view of the activity from on top of 12 fairway.

The first day of digging from 13 green.

The excavated material is hauled via 4 haul trucks to the far end of the driving range.

As you can see this pond will be very deep.

Back of the driving range where the loads are deposited. This area is being raised up to improve sight lines from the practice tee.

The material dug from the pond site is of very poor quality. The majority is peat moss and you can see the fibrous layers in the photo above.

This is one of four haul trucks currently operating on the golf course. These articulating trucks can haul 25-30 yards of material per trip. This particular truck was put out of service for a day while traveling across 9 fairway on a haul road. A cast iron irrigation line popped up out of the ground and destroyed a hydraulic line on the underside of the truck.

A typical haul road across a fairway.

9 fairway looking a little tough!

7 fairway dirt work.

14/15 dirt work

13 hill topsoil stripped and stockpiled.

5 fairway and green complex.

Sod was stripped from all 12 of our sand-based greens.

Once the sod was cut, a skid loader moves it into piles.

The 12 inches of greens mix is removed from the cavity and stockpiled. This mix will be used to sand-cap the new tee surfaces.

Bunker sand is being removed from all existing bunkers and stockpiled. This sand will be mixed into dirt work throughout the golf course to get rid of it.