Port Ludlow: Undergoing soft restoration for course

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Updated: April 4, 2016

After 40 years, Port Ludlow Golf Club decided it was time to change things up. The course, located on Washington’s Olympic Peninsula, celebrated its 40th anniversary last summer and Port Ludlow Golf Club decided that enhanced maintenance was required to retain the jewel that is the course at Port Ludlow.

Port Ludlow Golf Club General Manager, Shelly Washburn, brought the course’s original builder Dick Schmidt out of retirement and the pair came up with a two-year plan to restore the course back to its original vision created by renowned golf course architect Robert Muir Graves. Washburn describes the course as a work of art and explains that the two-year plan is designed to “polish the jewel” that has already been created rather than a full remodel.

A wireless control system has been established to assist with irrigation. The maintenance crew can control sprinkler heads remotely rather than manually, giving the course water where it needs it. The high water table on the lower portion of the course created drainage issues and as a result ditches and streams were reestablished on the perimeter of the course and culverts were replaced for better water flow. The course is now playable even with record rainfall.

Some of the fairways and greens at Port Ludlow lost their original shape over the years and the maintenance crew is redefining the course to its original shapes and contours. Bunker work is also part of the new plan at Port Ludlow as the bunkers will be reshaped creating better drainage and adding new sand.