BOARDMAN Mill Creek courses recovering from rain

Crews are re-seeding some of the holes on the south course.
By IAN HILL
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
BOARDMAN -- When Tom Mock stopped by the Mill Creek Park golf courses on July 9, he found that some of the fairways had disappeared.
The greens and the tees, meanwhile, had become islands.
"The greens were sticking out of the water. There was no way to get to them," said Mock, of Columbiana, who plays in the senior league at the courses on Wednesdays.
Senior league play was canceled during the week of July 7 and the course was closed for four and a half days as the Mahoning Valley was pounded with rain.
A week later, Mock was back in Mill Creek Park for the senior league. The grass was green; puffy white clouds slowly moved through the blue sky, and a cool, light breeze passed through the trees.
"It's terrific, for the amount of water they had there last week," Mock said.
Maintenance
Park Golf Director Dennis Miller said 4.92 inches of rain fell on the courses between July 4-11. During and after the storms, Miller and other park employees were out on the course cutting grass, raking errant sand back into bunkers, and removing a few tree limbs and branches that had fallen.
"I'm very happy with the way we've come along," Miller said. "We weathered the storm pretty well. The golf course is returning to the conditions we expect.
"If you look at the condition we were in [July 11] compared to today, it's like night and day," he said.
Many of the senior league golfers echoed Miller's assessment of the courses.
"It's amazing they got it into the shape it's in," said Bruce Wilkins of Boardman.
Joe Quinn of Youngstown said he felt the weather had helped improve the course, as the grass on some of the greens had not been cut during the storms. Before the rain, the grass on the greens had been too short, he said.
Dick Miller of Austintown noted that there are some wet spots on the courses, and the grass in the rough was long.
"It's kind of sloppy out there," he said, adding that he had taken relief from mud.
Miller added, however, that he believed park crews were working hard to repair the damage to the course.
"After all that rain, we're glad they're letting us out here," he said.
Damage
Dennis Miller said crews were working to repair some of the damage caused by water on the south course. He said portions of holes 13, 17 and 18 had been underwater, and the grass had died.
Crews were re-seeding sections of those holes, he said.
Miller noted that the park had upgraded the stormwater drainage system on holes 10, 17 and 18 last year, and even though sections of those holes were underwater for a time, the rain drained quickly.
Miller expects to have the courses back to normal by July 29, when they are slated to be the site of a U.S. Amateur qualifying tournament.
"If Mother Nature cooperates, we'll be right on track," he said.
hill@vindy.com