Sweetgum Greens Not In Good Shape......
 

Played Sweetgum yesterday and the greens are looking very bad. ? fungus? Lots of bald patches. They have a temporary green on one hole. Will we see it closing for the summer?

Agree they are awful. But many workers were there yesterday. Not sure what they were doing

They never are...Not much better any wheres else either
Powers to be thought they would save buck by not reseeding this past fall,,,

awful is not the word. The course is an embarrassment to The Villages and should be closed until fixed.

contact eric.vangorder@districtgov.org, he is responsible for the executive courses

Their greens have always been hard to maintain.

We have been playing the courses in the Fenney area and we think the greens are very good.

When the showbirds leave, we will start playing more closer to where we live.

It is too bad about Sweetgum because we love that course. Especially #6 when the grass is high and all you can see from the tee is the flag waving in the breeze.

I heard back from Eric, he was non comittal on the fix. He blamed the issues on environmental problems and contractor problems.

We played there yesterday and the greens are probably the worst in The Villages. The course should be closed immediately but that probably won’t happen. There is no excuse for letting them get to this condition. Same thing has happened a couple of other years as well. You would think they would learn from their mistakes.

I got an email today from district offices saying Sweetgum is closed until further notice.

Sweetgum Executive Golf Course Closure
In our efforts to keep the infrastructure of the Executive Golf Courses functioning correctly, the Sweetgum Executive Golf Course will be closed Tuesday, February 19, 2019 until further notice. We apologize for the inconvenience. If you have any questions or need additional information, please contact District Executive Golf at 352-674-1885.

That course was closed last year for quite awhile so the greens could be fixed. It was obviously a waste of money

That's why The Villages took back maintenance of the courses from the contractor.

Just my two cents worth.
Water is what is needed.
Greens are baked dry, and surface is crumbling.
They need wetting down several time a day.

It’s unfortunate they had to close. I will tell you this though, everyone that is involved with golf courses works their asses off to try to keep the courses in good shape. You think Eric Van Gorder, The Villages, or The District wants courses to be in bad shape? If the courses are in good shape, they will not have to deal with complaints thus making their lives/jobs easier. The executive courses in that area average over 60,000 rounds of golf a year which is absolutely unreal. Absolutely no where in the world runs that many rounds of golf through courses, let alone courses setup to be played as 9’s!! The average golfer takes 48 steps on a green according to the GCSAA. So let’s round that up to 50 because we know that there are more on the executive courses, that’s 3 million steps per green a year. That does not include any maintenance, ambassadors, and others who are out on the course. The fact that there is any grass in any area is amazing. You also have to remember things don’t always go as planned in life or a job. Before you all retired, did everything go perfectly and smooth at your previously place of employment?Or did you have to deal with speed bumps and some challenges along the way? Do you feel perfectly healthy all year? Or do you get sick from time to time? Same thing. All the courses are their own animals with different issues good or bad. They will get better and all the courses that are looking rough will also look better. But there will ALWAYS be issues and problems that arise when you are dealing with a line of work that is affected by an amazing amount of people, tough conditions, and the biggest factor Mother Nature!!!

Sincerely,

Former golf course superintendent