Dear LCC Member
  
    Three years ago we began a tradition of recognizing the important role our employees play in the well being of our golf course by creating an employee appreciation fund.  The response each year was encouraging and as those of you who contributed know both Jeff and Brian were very grateful.
  
    For the fourth year in a row Jeff and Brian both agreed to reductions in their levels of compensation and operating budgets to help LCC remain on an even keel.  We doubt that many would argue that both have managed to do more with less.  The condition of the course this year again presented many challenges and Brian and his crew rose to the occasion to address several very difficult issues.   We owe a great debt of gratitude to Brian for his hard work.  We have also received a number of compliments from our tournament customers with regard to our Pro and his staff.  In fact, several tournaments indicated that the main reason they stay with LCC is because of Jeff. 

                                                                                               Board of Directors
                                                                                             of Livingston Country
                                                                                                      Club

THE 4 MAN STAG ON SEPTEMBER 21ST HAS BEEN MOVED TO SEPTEMBER 28TH.

SIGN UP FOR THE YOUNGIES & OLDIES ON SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 3RD AT 1PM.

DON’T FORGET TO SIGN UP FOR THE 1 DAY MEMBER GUEST ON SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 11TH, 9AM SHOT GUN

          The BZ Tourney was once again a big success at LCC and as luck would have it LCC gained another member from the tourney.  Jim Maloney, long suffering member-guest partner of John Haugh won the drawing for a membership for 2012.  Jim promptly declared: “You have me for life!  I’m free of John Haugh at last.”  Jim has been a member of Old Hickory for some time but is a frequent LCC guest.  Now he’s one of us.  Jim can be reached at jim@icnysystems.com (Jim’s a computer geek–you’d never know.)   

           LCC also has another new member who has made use of the pay now and play all the rest of the season for free offer at LCC.  Tom Dougherty from up Groveland way has joined us.  Tom can be reached at tomd@sscimounsine.com.  (These guys have weird email addresses.) 

            We pride ourselves on being the friendly course.  Take a moment and wish Tom and Jim welcome to LCC. 

             August weather still is golf friendly.  Get out there aY!!! 

NEW MEMBERS–JOIN NOW FOR 2012 AND PLAY THE REST OF 2011 FOR FREE
It’s August.  Time to enjoy warm days and cool nights.  And it’s time to let your friends know that if they join LCC now they can play for the rest of 2011 for FREE  by paying their dues for 2012 now.  Every year we make this offer and every year 4 or 5 people take us up on it.  So if you know of someone who is thinking of joining LCC next year tell them to pay now and play the rest of this season for free.  (Folks who join now are not eligible for the Club Championship.) 

LCC INTRODUCES THE ONE PARENT FAMILY MEMBERSHIP
Many families have only one parent that plays golf.  It’s very expensive to buy a family membership when it’s just you and your kids.  To give more families a chance to enjoy LCC the Board has authorized a new family membership.  The parent pays the single fee and the first child under 18 that lives at home is only an additional $150.  Each additional child is only $50!!  Now more families in which there is only one golfer can join.  We need to keep young people interested in golf and most especially LCC.  Tell friends about the new membership.

IMPORTANT NOTE:  PURSUANT TO AN AMENDMENT OF THE BY-LAWS  ALL  DUES FOR 2012 ARE DUE ON NOVEMBER 15, 2011.  THERE WILL BE  A PAYMENT PLAN OPTION AVAILABLE. 

WE WOULD LIKE TO THANK EVERYONE FOR PLAYING IN THE TOURNAMENT AND THOSE FOLKS WHO MADE DONATIONS. TOGETHER WE RAISED $3000 TO BENEFIT LIVINGSTON COUNTRY CLUB.

1ST  STEVE BONES-JON HANN-MIKE RUSSER-JERRY GUINTA                     104
2ND  KELLY PALMER-RON PALMER-TOM BEARD                                         112
2ND  DON SEIDEL-DAN GLEASON-DENNY PEARSTON-DENISE PEARSTON    112

First I would like to thank all the past and future participant’s of the Superintendent Tournament.The monies raised from this tournament have been used to improve and upgrade many things on the course including improvements to the irrigation system, which this season have helped enable us to keep up with this drought and provide a playable surface. With out these upgrades, I do not think we would have been able to keep things green.

This year my plans are to purchase two pieces of much needed equipment. First I have purchased a used “Slit seeder” with as soon as the weather allows will let me begin to over seed fairways #12 and #14. Along with a very aggressive airifying program this fall and continued use of liquid fertilizer and wetting agents,will hopefully improve those fairway’s without having to close them to do a total renovation. Next, I have purchased another “walking”greens mower. We have decided for a least another year to continue to mow #11 by hand and this will aid in that operation. Also we have begun this year to mow the cleanup pass on all the greens by hand. Although this has created another job and more work for us, we have already seen the improvement and elimination of the stress and wear pattern created by the riding mowers going around the green each day, in the same spot and causing damage to the turf.

Again, thank you to everyone for being patient and understanding of the “less than perfect” conditions. We are trying.

Smitty

Yesterday Kareen Roberts sent out a copy of a message Smitty sent to the Board giving us an update on the status of #11 Green.  We felt the information was important for all members.  It may be that some of you cannot open the attachment Kareen sent. In that regard, Smitty’s memo to the Board is printed below.  In addition I have included a message from our Greens Chair–Tom Moran–that discusses how to fix ball marks. (Smitty’s report mentions that many ball marks on #11 are not repaired.)  PLEASE–FIX ALL BALL MARKS YOU SEE AND PLEASE FOLLOW ALL CART SIGNS.  IF YOU SEE SOMEONE NOT FOLLOWING THE SIGNS REMIND THEM POLITELY TO FOLLOW THE SIGNS AS THEY ARE ONLY THERE TO PROTECT OUR COURSE.   Many Thanks BOARD OF DIRECTORS OF LCC.

MESSAGE FROM OUR COURSE SUPERINTENDENT

The green at #11 has been showing signs of stress and turf loss. I called in 2 area turf reps and had Tony, the head foreman from the green builder, Jack Faery’s Golf and Landscape,inc. come on
Friday and take a look. We took samples from the green, looking at the root system and reviewed the maintenance program. All three experts had the same thoughts on what has been happening as what I have been saying.

The sod is new sod that has been relocated to a different site. It will take some time for this sod to reach maturity and strength. The green gets a lot of traffic. The weather has not been perfect and
we were told when we built it that we might need to take it back out of play at different times to give it a break. We are doing everything possible to keep it playable and open. We will be airifying it on a weekly basis, we have raised the height of cut slightly and will continue to mow it by hand. We will be manually removing cores in some areas and filling them by hand with a seed and top dressing mix. We are also going to change the approach to the way we water it, going to more light frequent watering instead of infrequent, deep watering. All three felt that we will see complete recovery in the fall and to be prepared for a couple of years of possible “stress conditions” depending on the weather and how long it takes to get this sod used to it’s new environment.

What else could be done is to stop having every contest on there such as closest to the pin etc. Trying to minimize traffic and possibly getting players to enter and exit the green in different areas.

None of these issues were unknown to us and although we had no other options on the re-build, the number one choice is to grow a green from seed which would take a year and a half or to sod with turf
taken from on site, which we did not have to help reduce the chance of the stress and loss of turf that we are seeing.

HOW TO FIX A BALL MARK

Repairing a ball mark on a green takes seconds, but can save weeks of healing to the turf.
1. Use a divot repair tool whenever possible. Every golfer should have one.
2. Insert the repair tool at the edge of  the ball mark. Do NOT inset the tool within the depression itself.
3. Push the tool forward from the edge of the ball mark toward the center. Do this around the edges of the indentation.
4. Do NOT insert the tool under the indented area and try to pry up the depressed turf – a common mistake. Think of it as pushing turf in from the edges towards the center
5.  Tamp down the repaired area with your putter so that the surface is even.

If your ball mark on the green has actually displaced a piece of turf, do not replace it, just work around the edges with your repair tool. You not only should always repair your ball marks, but time permitting, you should repair any other ball marks you see, also.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 6TH. TWO MAN MEMBER MEMBER

SUNDAY, JULY 1OTH. TOURNAMENT OF CHAMPIONS, OPEN TO ALL TOURNAMENT WINNERS FROM 2009, 2010 AND 2011. THERE WERE 28 WINNERS FROM THE GET ACQUAINTED SCRAMBLE.

FRIDAY, JULY 15TH AND SATURDAY, JULY 16TH, STUB WEBB MEMBER GUEST.

CALL OR STOP IN THE PRO SHOP TO SIGN UP FOR ANY OF THESE EVENTS.

CONGRATULATIONS TO THE WINNERS

SENIORS

1ST  JIM MATSON               78-13=65
1ST  TRACY MCDONALD      85-20=65
3RD  DAN BEIKIRCH           74-07=67
3RD  STEVE SCOFIELD       74-07=67
5TH  DON SAVINO              79-10=69
5TH  DENNY PEARSTON      95-26=69

SUPER SENIORS

1ST  TOM POPE                 84-18=66
2ND  BOB O’CONNELL        89-22=67
3RD  TIM HOWLAND           85-16=69

BATTAGLIA, PRESIDENT’S, DIRECTOR’S AND CHAIRMAN’S CUP MATCHES ARE BEING PLAYED, PLEASE PLAY THESE MATCHES BY THE DUE DATES.

CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL THE WINNERS

LADIES

1ST KARENNE ROBERTS-SYBIL HUNT                -1
2ND CAROLYN TORREY-KIM PIER                      -2

MEN

1ST JIM HUNT-DAN GLEASON                            14     PLAYOFF
2ND DAN BEIKIRCH-GARY SIMPSON                   14
3RD CHRIS HELLEMS-JEFF POPE                         12
4TH CARL JOHANTGEN-JON HANN                       6
5TH DEREK HICKS-PETE SAVINO                        4
5TH JIM PERI-ERIC BARNARD                             4
7TH DAVE KELLEY-DAVE DAPRILE                      0
8TH JIM MATSON-GEORGE-GAGNIER                  -1
9TH DON SCALIA-STEVE SCOFIELD                    -2
9TH SCOTT HICKS-DON SAVINO                        -2