From the President

It has certainly been a very busy year for our Morro Bay Golf Club. Your Board members have done a tremendous job this year by providing you with a very full schedule of events and keeping well within the budget constraints of this year. As your President for the past two years, I take some pride in the fact that I personally helped "recruit" (encouraged maybe a better term) these individuals to serve on our Board. Their energy, enthusiasm, and cooperation, has made my job much easier and certainly very memorable.

December 8th will be my last board meeting as your presiding President. At our general meeting on November 10th, we elected some new faces to the board. However, I am so pleased to know that Jack Johnson and Bill McCann are committing for another two years. They have served our club with great distinction. And our newest addition to the board, Sam Mangum, well, you just couldn't find a better player representative.

The challenges facing our golf club are not unfamiliar to any of us. We will continue to face, I'm afraid, a slowing economy which puts a strain on maintaining our membership. However, this year we have gained more than 30 new members which speaks highly, I think, of our clubs activities as well as its friendly and gregarious membership.

I am looking forward to next year's exciting and eventful schedule.

2010 Renewals

Your renewal notice is availabe at the clubhouse during our Tuesday play. If you would like it mailed to you, please contact Margaret Breen at morrobaygc@hotmail.com Please take a minute to verify the information we have for you.

Renewals are due by Dec. 20th.

Fee Increase

While our club dues have not changed for 2010, the NCGA has raised its fees. The NCGA individual membership has increased by $6 and this is reflected in your renewal costs.

We had good success with the High School donations collected on last year’s renewal form, so we are once again including an optional donation to support Morro Bay and/or Coast Union High Schools.

Club Roster Online

We now have a roster of club members available on our web site. The menu selection on the far right and is for Members Only.

You must be a member of our club to access the roster. If you need information on your password, please contact Margaret Breen at morrobaygc@hotmail.com

You can review your information and you can view the Name, Phone Numbers, and Email address of other members.

If you indicated on your club application that we could not display your information in a roster, then only your name is displayed. If you wish to change this, please contact Margaret Breen at morrobaygc@hotmail.com

Notes from our General Meeting

The Morro Bay Golf Club held its annual general meeting in conjunction with its Turkey Trot golf tournament and election of board members at Dairy Creek on November 10th. There were 61 members in attendance.

Now, some members have asked why we hold our meeting at Dairy Creek and not a Morro Bay. Well, every Tuesday the Rotary Club meets at Morro Bay and if we want to serve our members a great lunch (which we do every year) then we have to relocate to a facility that will accommodate a bunch of hungry golfers.

After recognizing our esteemed (retired) golf course Superintendent, Tom Massey, for his dedicated 34 years of service to the golfing community, we proceeded to electing next year's board of directors. Both Jack Johnson and Bill McCann will remain on the board along with newly elected board member Sam Mangum. Continuing to serve on the board will be Norm Williams (Treasurer), Rick Betterley (VP), and Margaret Breen (handicap chairperson).

It has been suggested that our weekly tournament chairperson (this year it has been Jim Watts...what a great job he has done!) be divided up on a monthly basis so no one individual has the responsibility for the entire year.Several individual members have already volunteered to take a month and Don Albin has graciously accepted the role of "coordinating" the monthly tournament chairpersons.

President, Chuck Stoll, then put forward a few "survey questions" that all the members could respond to with a show of hands or a brief comment.

(1) "Who would be in favor of raising the $3 weekly buy-in to $4.00?" (overwhelming support for $4)

(2) "How many of you would be in favor of playing other clubs, or other golf courses on days other than Tuesday?" (approx. 25 raised their hands)

(3) "How many of you would be interested in playing a weekly skins game?" (approx.18 people raised their hands)

(4) "What would you suggest we do about SLOW PLAY?" (put notoriously slow players last; have the marshals speed up play; put notoriously slow players 3-somes instead of 4-somes)

(5) "Should the club help subsidize players who qualify for NCGA events as they represent our golf club? It is very costly for those who do qualify.... (no suggestions were forthcoming).

The general meeting was adjourned at 2:15 PM and everyone went home with full stomachs and fond memories

Thank You, Tom Massey

We, the Morro Bay Golf club, gave retiring superintendent Tom Massey a 100 year old framed sepia print of the Morro Bay golf course before it was a golf course! The view is from the present museum showing the only building in sight, a small white house, the rock and Black Hill. It turns out that he was raised in that house and he and his family have worked our course for the last 59 years! Tom said he would not miss getting up at 3:30 every morning, but we will miss him.

Summer Team Play Recap

This year our NCGA Summer Team play was extended to 4 teams. We played 3 away matches and traveled to Bayonet, Carmel Valley Ranch and SLO country club finishing with a 2 and 4 record. New players Gregg Ross, Josh Heptig, Randy Kleinhammer, Arby Kitzman, Rita Carnes, Rudi Semenza, Chris Van Winkle and Dennis Marty were welcome additions. Our overall points winners were:     Alex Kuchenmeister with 12     Randy Kleinhammer with 11     Rudi Semenza with 10. Josh Heptig got 8 points in only 3 matches, Chris Van Winkle got 6 in only 2 and Jim Watts got the only max points with 4 in only one! Thanks to all players and I hope to see you next year.......Jack

Bayonet Team Carmel Valley Ranch Team

Rules Update

The Morro Bay Golf Club Board of Directors has adopted a new policy regarding Tuesday Play-day. All members playing on Tuesday Play-day must play their round under the rules of golf and must post a score. This policy applies whether you are signed up and pay for the weekly tournament or not. There has been too much confusion as to who is playing in the weekly tournament, and who must be playing by the rules. Thanks in advance for your cooperation

SUPER News

Josh Heptig is our superintendent for the County of San Luis Obispo. He has offered to contribute a regular column for our newlsetter.

It is the time of year when the days are growing shorter, the temperatures are getting cooler, and we have some rain on the horizon, let’s hope!! We have been blessed with some remarkable weather this fall and I am sure there will be more to come as we approach the holiday season. Sometimes we take for granted our ability to enjoy such a mild climate. So grab your clubs and head for the course!

My guys in the field are hard at work prepping the turf for the months ahead. We will be applying some fungicides to keep the fusarium patch disease under control. Fusarium patch is a fungus caused by cooler temperatures and moist conditions and primarily attacks Poa annua grass. This disease shows up as a 1-6” pink or gray rings on the surface of the green and if untreated can significantly effect ball roll. The greens are near perfect as I write this newsletter and it is our intention to keep them this way!

The Kikuyu grass is beginning to slow down and move toward semi-dormancy. You may notice areas around the greens and even in the collars that look brown or maybe starving for water. This is actually a result of a chemical we use to control the Kikuyu grass to keep this invasive turf from encroaching into the greens. Staff will be prepping and seeding these areas soon and they should fill in quickly. While the Kikuyu grass is in this state of semi-dormancy it is more susceptible to cart traffic, which can result in excessive wear and/or increased weed pressure come spring. It would be very helpful if carts were to follow the 90-degree rule and keeping carts on paths around greens and tees at this time of year. If you have physical conditions that limit your mobility and need closer access to the greens, please pick up a blue flag from the pro shop to indicate these disabilities. With this access I would ask that we still keep carts at least 30 feet from all greens and tees. Thanks for your help and your fellow golfers thank you as well.

If you have any questions, concerns, or comments do not hesitate to contact me. My email address is jheptig@co.slo.ca.us and my phone # is 781-1318. Checkout my new blog, slocountygolfcourses.blogspot.com, to keep up with what is happening at our three county courses.

Southern California Moving to GHIN

In 2010 the Southern California Golf Associations (SCGA, WPLGA, etc.) will be moving to the GHIN software, which is the same software that the NCGA uses.

Golfers who belong to both organizations will no longer have two numbers. You will only have one number and one handicap. The plan is that your NCGA/GHIN# is the one you will retain after the change.

So, if you have both an NCGA/GHIN# and a Southern CA number, please let the Handicap Chair of your Southern CA club know your GHIN# . This will ease the transition and ensure you don’t lose any history.

For the rest of us, this means that starting in 2010, posting at Avila or Blacklake or any of the other SCGA courses will be just like posting at Dairy Creek!

Weekly Play

We could really use your help in the way you complete your score cards for our weekly games!

Please list your handicap! If we have to look it up for every player we would never get done!

Please put first AND LAST names.
You know who was in your group, but we find it hard to decide which Bill or Bob or Jack you are referring to. Wouldn’t want the prize money going to the wrong player!

And please make sure you are only signed up once! We have had a lot of duplicate signups lately which has caused confusion for the starter and players.

Pictures Wanted!

Any members with digital pictures that they think would be appropriate for the web site should contact Margaret Breen at  morrobaygc@hotmail.com