Not far from The Gauntlet is Meadows
Farms in Locust Grove, and that public
venue was a bit more fortunate than
its neighbor.
“We got this black mold early in the
summer, but we saw it coming,” said
Josh Dotson, Meadows Farms general
manager. “We were able to spray, and we
kept spraying all summer. We never lost
a single green, but our maintenance bud-
get is up over 40 percent. We’ve spent
the money with the dream we’d have a
great fall. Now, we’re getting rain again.
My superintendent (Scott Caskie) said
the conditions this year were probably
the worst they’ve been in 50 years.”
A significant byproduct of so much
rain were three words dreaded by any-
one responsible for the bottom line of
a public golf course—Cart Path Only
(CPO). At Meadows Farms, Dotson esti-
mated that 90 percent of the rounds
from mid-March to October have been
CPO, one reason the course is already
5,000 rounds below normal.
“We lean heavily on the senior demo-
graphic,” he said. “When it’s cart path
only, they don’t want to play.”
Another byproduct of the rain can be
seen in the rough at many courses. Rath-
er than risk mowing equipment getting
bogged down in the mud, many courses
have simply let the grass grow, and let it
grow some more.
“We had a lot of rain last year and our
members thought the rough was bad,”
said Steve Nixon at Tuscarora. “This
year was worse. Our members have been
complaining because we usually cut it
to 2 1/4 inches. Right now, it’s probably
six inches, and the rain keeps coming.
They’re not happy.”
The same could not be said for the
membership or anyone else playing at
Two Rivers in Williamsburg. The Senior
Open of Virginia was held there in early
September, and competitors from around
the state frequently came off the course
raving about its remarkable condition.
Superintendent Brent Graham said
there was one main reason.
“We have all the resources to do what-
ever we need to do,” he said. “We’re at a
private club and if we need to do some-
thing, we can do it. If the weather isn’t
right, I can push up my aeration dates if I
have to and no one complains about that.
We have fans going on all the greens.
We have the equipment to remove trees
right away. A lot of courses don’t have
that luxury, and they do the best they can
with what they’ve got.
“This hasn’t been easy for any of us.
We average about 40 inches of rain a
year, and we hit that mark in September
with three months left. This club dedi-
cated itself to a great drainage program,
and that really helped. I know this, as
bad as it was, it could have been a whole
lot worse.”
Leonard Shapiro covered golf for more than
20 years at The Washington Post and is a
past president of the Golf Writers Associa-
tion of America.