Drought Response
Salt Lake City Golf Division Drought Plan
Our staff is always committed to conserving water and making our irrigation systems as efficient as possible, but this year it’s even more important. Here is our plan to conserve water through the extreme drought conditions our state is currently facing:
- Stage 1 – Begin programming adjustments of 5% to driving ranges and practice area. Reduce irrigation to out-of-play areas by a minimum of 10%.
- Stage 2 – Programming adjustments and reduced irrigation in nonessential play areas to reflect an overall usage reduction of 5% based on a 5-year average. Additionally, increase use of surfactants and organic products as necessary to maximize useable irrigation applied. Could sustain for 21 to 35 days with minimal impact to turf appearance, quality and playability.
- Stage 3 – Programming adjustments and eliminate nonessential play area irrigation (capping sprinkler heads or turning valves off) increase cutting heights, continue and possibly increase use of surfactants and organics. Efforts will reflect an overall usage reduction of 15% based on a 5-year average. Could sustain for 14 to 21 days with noticeable impacts to turf appearance, quality and playability.
- Stage 4 – Programming adjustments prioritized in order of importance (greens, tees, fairways and roughs) with hand watering of areas on greens and tees, further increases in cutting heights along with traffic control and continue with surfactants and organics. Efforts will reflect an overall usage reduction of 25% based on a 5-year average. Could sustain for 7 to 14 days before significant impact to turf quality and playability mostly in fairways and rough areas.
- Stage 5 – Programming adjustments prioritized in essential order (greens, tees, fairways and roughs) with supplemental irrigation, hand-watering areas of importance, maintain cutting height increases and decrease mowing frequencies and continue with surfactants and organics. Efforts will reflect an overall usage reduction of 35% based on a 5-year average. Could sustain for 7 days before turf loss in realized significant impact to turf quality and playability though out golf course.
Each course has different needs and resources. For example, Mountain Dell’s cutbacks will be more severe because their source is shared with Public Utilities and they need to drain Little Dell reservoir this summer for repair and maintenance. Nibley Park is manually irrigated and it is more difficult to control use.
For more information on water conservation plans for all four Salt Lake City Public Lands divisions click here.