Ponds

 I'm sure most all of you are seeing the water levels are down in the ponds. Mother Nature has denied us our normal rainfall for some time now, In fact we are some 10 to 12 inches behind in rainfall. Let's all hope it will start raining soon.
 Some of you may be questioning why we are not filling the ponds now. When the course opened in 1990 there was no cost using groundwater so therefore it was never a problem to use whatever we needed. So in this case yes, we filled all of our ponds to the rim year round. Well unfortunately times have changed, today the water authority are now charges us for groundwater usage. As an example, in the year 2000 The Subsidence district formed a Water Regional Authority to regulate groundwater usage. The Authority had to come up with a plan on how to supply gray water to all non potable water users, such as golf courses, right aways, baseball & football fields. The Authority started charging for groundwater usage to start; from there studies were developed in planning how to supply this water to the needed facilities.
 In 2000 Willow Fork paid .12 p/1000 gallons of water, which led to around $5000 to $8,000 a year in water. In 2011 the Authority charges $1.20 p/1000 gallons, which leads to around $50,000 to $80,000 a year.
With this type of weather we're experiencing meaning no rainfall; means increase in water cost dramatically therefore there are areas that we had to cut back on, lakes will no longer be filled by well water and watering the course in non golfing related areas. The greens and tees will be watered as needed they are the top priority for us to keep maintained at a consistent level. The fairways and roughs will be watered as needed in order to maintain a green color. Once the rain begins to fall again, the scheduled watering will get back on a consistent basis and I can fertilize the course to help improve the quality of the turf. Bottom line is It needs to start raining! Thanks to everyone for your understanding.