Yoakum Golf Course gets new greens

The Yoakum Golf Course received some new greens for their course.

“ The greens are TifEagle grass,” Yoakum Golf Course Association President Patrick Matusek said. “That’s the best grass you can get for a golf green on all of the championship golf courses. They were put in and they have done a good job of keeping water and sand on them.”

Greens are considered the most important part of a golf course because most shots are aimed and played there.

These greens are designed solely to be smooth enough for balls to roll predictably and be a realistic target for golfers. TifEagle greens maintains the color of the golf course in cool temperatures.

The golf courses are now ready for play.

“They are looking fantastic and it was much needed,” Matusek said. “Ever since the freeze from four years ago, we’ve had some issues. When that freeze hit, it was really tough on the greens and the root system, and we just had never been able to get those old greens to come back. They’ve been spotty and there have been areas where the grass was dead.”

All the good golf courses redo their greens every 20 to 40 years according to Matusek.

“These older greens were about 60 to 70 years old,” Matusek said.

The city assisted in bringing in these new greens.

“They reconstructed the greens and reconstructed the contours,” Matusek said. “They cut out one to two feet of the old dirt and they recontoured and reshaped everything. That was about $50,000 for those three greens (paid by the city) and the golf course association paid the $5,500 shipping fee from north Texas to get this grass down here.”

The other greens for the rest of the course are in good shape.

Matusek said the Yoakum Golf Courses is one of the finer golf courses in the area with these new greens.

“I would say Cuero is right up there at the top,” Matusek said. “They got about $750,000 in grants to improve their golf course in the last five to ten years. Now, we are encouraging the city to write some of those requests for grants.”

Matusek said the new city manager and new city council of Yoakum have been quite supportive of the improvements for the Yoakum Golf Course.

“We actually asked the city if they would be interested in doing another three greens the following budget year and they said they would take it under consideration,” Matusek said.

“They’ve been very cooperative in working with the Golf Course Association in trying to keep that golf course in shape.”

Some of the fees for renting out the golf course have recently changed.

“Since late October, we were informed that those who are having a benefit tournament, they would pay $500 to close the golf course for that tournament,” Matusek said. “That’s the new policy. Other towns charge way more than that, up to $750 to $1,000 to close it, so that’s very reasonable.”

New sprinkler heads for the greens have also been installed. They were about $3,000.

Matusek said his goal is to make the Yoakum Golf Course one of the top 25 golf courses in the State of Texas. In the past, the Yoakum Golf Course had this title at one point.

“It is a benefit to have a nice golf course,” Matusek said. “People enjoy it.”