Mira Mesa 3-12-23

Mira Mesa 3-12-23 Contractor: Down to Earth dtelandscape.com

Here is what I saw Sunday 3-12-23 at Mira Mesa.

Hole 1

The tee box is in great shape.

However, the small weed in the picture was between my feet as I teed off and you can see that it is going to seed. Those seeds are all going to germinate because the contractor is not applying the pre-emergent weed controls as called for in the contract. There is evidence of this all over the course. The annual crab grasses are germinating right now and growing fast. You will see a picture from the 7th fairway (new grass) of this crab grass. Most all of your new rock displays have weeds growing in them already which are growing from seeds that germinated because there is no pre-emergent weed control. The contractor saves thousands of dollars by not using the weed control.

By the way, the contractor is not applying any post-emergent weed control either. Lots of pictures of this all over the course.

Further it is noticeable that the tee markers are not being moved around. Later there is picture of the 4th tee showing the hitting area in the middle of the box. The box could be divided into 6 areas and moved everyday to allow the grass to recover. You need to remove the decision making from the maintenance setup guy and institute a rotation. The ninth hole has 5 tee boxes. Your rotation needs to include all five tees. You need to post the rotation so that we can see if they are following it.

This is the collar area in front of the first green. I think this is called goose grass (weed) and it is all going to seed. It does not take long for your new renovation to look bad.

This is a different type of weed to the side of the green.

A couple of small damaged areas in the green. Do you have a plan for their repair?

What is your plan for teaching the contractor how to cut cups ? I have been sending you pictures of poor cup cutting since September. Seven months and you can't fix a small thing like this.

You only have three contractors. That is three people to talk to. Tell them to fix it. How hard is that.

I am not sure why there is a plug by the edge of the green. It is not healing. Maybe you need to water the greens. Someone with an Agronomy Degree would know how to get this plug to heal. Who "on site" from Down to Earth has an Agronomy degree ?
This is right behind the first green and you can see all of the weeds growing at the base of the ferns.
Walking to the 2nd tee. Lots of weeds that were not dealt with in the renovation. Just like Silver Lake's recent renovation, the vast majority of the weeds on the property were not dealt with. It does not take long for those weeds to find their way back to the greens, collars, fairways and tee boxes.
Walking to the second tee and you see more weeds and debris. This is right next to the cart path.

Hole 2

This is in the fairway. There are three different types of weeds in the picture. Remember this is a new grass area that should be weed free.

The contract calls for the paths to be edged and weed and grass free.

Hole 3

Walking to the 3rd tee. Weeds in the landscaping.

The weeds are not showing up well in the picture, but there is a bunch of 12" thin bladed weeds.
Annual crab grass
This new fairway is filling up with weeds.
The grass is not doing very good in this part of the fairway.

These weeds are located between the trap and green. This whole area was renovated.

Walking to the 4th tee. The weeds love the rocks
They have only used the middle of this tee box. It should be divided into maybe 6 zones and moved around daily.
The front collar of the 4th green. The contractor might be stretching the mowing 2-3 times per week.

Hole 5

This is the back side of the 5th green. The sun was highlighting the weeds for the picture.

Hole 6

Lots of leaves all over the course. None of the leaves are being picked up and removed.

This is located next to the 6th green.

These weeds are just off of the back edge of the green. Yes they are small now, but soon they will be everywhere.

Hole 7

Notice the weeds in the landscaping. The weeds were not killed prior to the new pine straw being put down.

I have seen worse, but these yardage markers need to be edged.
This annual crab grass is in the middle of the new fairway grass.
Plug set too low. The Superintendent should have had this plug raised. He can still fix it.

Hole 8

Front collar area.