I was asked a great question

I was asked a great question this morning.  "Why aren't you watering fairways?"  In all honesty, I have not altered any of the fairway programs from last year.  We water fairways on a 3 day a week schedule for which they receive 20 minutes of water per irrigation day.  It has been very dry lately and our weak spots are showing.  Unfortunately, we have a lot of weak spots in our fairways.  Our Irrigation system is close to 30 years old, and just like a 30 year old car it breaks down a lot.  We fix the plumbing breaks as quickly as we can.  But, we also have electrical breaks to worry about.  Every irrigation head on the golf course has 2 wires running to it(a hot and a ground).  Each head also has a solenoid that tells the head whether or not to operate.  These are two of the problems with our irrigation system.  Priority #1 is to keep the water contained in the irrigation system.  Priority #2 is to make sure that the water is distributed through it properly.  I believe that we have 50 of 54 zones of the irrigation system live with water,  The 4 zones that are not live with water are scheduled for repair.  On to the electrical problems.  the most inconsistent areas that we get irrigation to are our fairways.  We have some holes such as 3, 9, 11, 13, 14, 16 and 17 that get what I would consider adequate coverage (over 50% of the irrigation heads come on because they receive an electrical signal).  We have holes such as 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 18 have what I would consider inadequate irrigation (less than 50% of the irrigation heads get an electrical signal).  Then there is #12 fairway that receives no water due to electrical failures.  As I stated earlier, faulty wiring and solenoids are usually the culprit for an irrigation head not coming up electrically.  The problem is trouble shooting the electrical issue  for 1 irrigation head can take up to 4 hours to determine the problem.  My priority for Irrigation control is in the order of Greens, Tees, Fairways and then Roughs.  That is the order of priorities for fixing things on the golf course.  I'm not trying to say that we don't work on electrical issues on the golf course, because we do.  Currently we are working on electrical issues with #6-7 greens heads.  After we fix that area I want to work on #13 Tee area that gets 0 water. 

This is one of the many jobs that we do on the course other than mowing the grass.  But, first things first we need to get the water to stay in the pipes. 

If you have any questions please don't hesitate to ask them.