From Steve Date:
Those of us who have played Gross for a while know that trees have been disappearing with some regularity in recent years. I received a note from Gross Men’s Club member Tim Faust a few days ago saying that he’d driven past the course and noticed that some additional trees have been removed or trimmed since the season ended. He decided to stop, walk the course, and take some notes. I thought his detailed account of the changes he saw would be of interest to GMC members so I asked Tim if I could put it here on the NEWS & INFO page. He recommended that I first check with the management and ask for comment about the changes. I emailed Gross Manager Dave Bratland and asked him to tell us the what and why of the recent work.
Here’s what Dave wrote back to me, followed by Tim’s description of what he noticed while walking the course.
From Dave Bratland:
Yes, we are doing some course “renovations”. With the very limited budget we have, it’s a process that’s going to take several years. The USGA visited our course several years ago. They really liked the course, but the one comment they made was that we have too many trees.
By what we’re doing, we hope to accomplish the following:
Create better turf conditions by removing some trees and trimming trees around greens and trees that overhang the fairways. Too many of our trees block the sunlight needed to have the turf conditions that we all want to have.
“thinning” out areas of the course where there is a high concentration of trees, therefore Improving the “playability” of the golf course. We want the golfer to be able to advance the ball toward the green as much as possible.
Removing trees that are in front of bunkers
Remove the trees that are in poor condition.
From Tim Faust:
I drove past the course recently and noticed that they took out more trees so I walked the course to check things out. Here is the full report:
#2 - They removed a few trees on the right side 175 yards from the green and closer. That really opens up that side if you run it through the fairway.
#3 - They trimmed the low hanging branches on the oak just to the left of the blue tee.
#4 - The two trees that framed the drives at the knoll have been removed. They also removed a number of trees on the left and right side inside of 100 yards.
#5 - They removed the big maple that hung out into the fairway on the left side about 125 yards from the green.
#6 - They removed the big cottonwood short of the green side bunker on the right.
#9 - They removed some oaks on the left between 150 and 250 yards from the green. Inexplicably, they drove right by the big cottonwood on the left that hangs across half of the fairway. They didn't touch it.
#15 - They removed the big tree on the left side of the fairway that catches a lot of drives. They also removed the big tree short of the fairway bunker on the right. At about 100 yards from the green on the left, they removed that lone tall tree that was near the rough line.
#16 - They removed several maples that guarded the dogleg on the right. You still need to get past the one tall tree before the hole starts to dogleg but if you get past that you should be okay.
They also trimmed the lower branches on some trees and removed a handful that weren't in play.