Bill Barnard, General Manager
This time of the year marks a season when many homeowners are going to cooler parts of the country to get away from the heat of the desert. It is also a time of the year when the climate presents challenges for our landscape and golf course maintenance crews. In my message this month, I would like to share what our crews are doing during the summer months to help PebbleCreek look good all year round.
We have a very large community of over four square miles, much of which is common areas, grass, and golf courses. Maintaining these areas is a huge, and ongoing, undertaking. We have over 300 acres of maintained common areas. We have well over 100,000 plants, flowers, bushes, shrubs, and trees, not to mention more than 280 acres of turf to include Sunrise Park, common areas, the dog park, and golf courses. It takes a team to manage it all.
The landscape maintenance team is headed by Enrique Vigil, Landscape Superintendent, with oversight from Greg Fausto, Assistant General Manager. They oversee the HOA common area maintenance crew, as well as the work done by crews from our contracted landscape company, AAA. The HOA crew maintains clubhouse areas, sports courts, parking lots, pools, and main streets. They also respond to issues identified by homeowners via PebbleHelp.org, patrol, or the ALC office. AAA maintains the common areas throughout the community on an 8-week rotation, the dog park, semiannual flower rotation, irrigation, weed control, and special projects that may arise throughout the year. Our golf courses are taken care of by our golf course maintenance teams led by Jeff Lebo, Golf Course Superintendent at Eagle’s Nest, and Joe Miller, Golf Course Superintendent at Tuscany Falls. They oversee all of the maintenance at their respective golf courses.
During the summer months, we tackle one of the largest projects we have annually, trimming the palm trees throughout the community and golf courses. There are over 5,000 palms that will be trimmed along main roads, community common areas, and golf courses. Total Care Tree Specialists have been contracted for this project, which starts at the end of May and will run through the month of July. Another major project during the summer months is the annual aerification of the golf courses. Aerification is the process where cores of soil and grass are pulled out of the greens, fairways, roughs, and tee boxes in order to reduce compaction, change the soil profile, and allow water and air to penetrate into the soil and to speed up the summer transition of grass. It is also helpful to leach the salts that have accumulated at the surface due to the high salinity of our irrigation water. Each golf course will be closed for three weeks during their respective projects, which start on May 31. The schedule of course closures has been posted on the golf page of the website. AAA will handle the aerification for common area turf this summer.
The summer season is when we transition from winter rye grass to summer Bermuda grass. Many people do not realize that we are growing two different crops of grass and that the transition is a common process in Arizona. It can be concerning to see the rye grass die out with brown spots, but the summer Bermuda base will come back, and green turf will return. The transition process has already begun both chemically and naturally. We spray the turf with a growth regulator beginning in April, and when the temperatures reach into the 100s during the day and stay above 70 overnight, the rye grass starts dying out. The Bermuda will begin to wake up without competition from the rye grass, but doesn’t start flourishing until our humidity levels increase during the monsoon period in July and August. The next few months are a rough time for the aesthetics of the grass, and brown patches are the norm until the Bermuda grass can fully take hold. The goal is that by Sept. 1 we have full coverage of Bermuda once again.
These crews of hard-working staff are dedicated to doing their very best to maintain our grounds and golf courses with the many challenges they face with Mother Nature and other factors. I am proud of the work the Landscape and Golf Course Maintenance teams are doing, especially during the incredibly hot summer months. I hope as you drive, bike, and walk through the community, you will take a moment to appreciate how truly beautiful this community really is.