Wil Riggs and Cindy Riggs Celebrate Mother's Day at Bowling Green Golf Club

I remember fondly a particularly special Mother’s Day at Bowling Green Golf Club when I was able to play 18 holes of golf with my son, Wil. This hasn’t happened too often because he happens to work on Mother’s Day, but I’m thinking of asking him to play 9 holes with me this year.

Wil, as the manager of the Bowling Green Pro Shop, always seems to manage to gift me with the things on my golf wish list. One year it was my Callaway 3 wood; the next it was a Sky Caddie Rangefinder, last year my Razr Hawk driver and this year perhaps a Sun Mountain cart friendly carry bag with a Bowling Green logo. I am a very lucky mom.

 If you are looking for fun ideas and activities for Mom this Mother’s Day, we welcome you to treat the moms in your life to a special day on the golf course, in The Grill Room, or you can stop by the pro shop for some cool new gear.

You can start the day off with a family round on the course. Bowling Green’s 5051-yard layout from the forward tees is a very friendly distance for women and juniors. And if Mom is already a player, consider the $195 golf membership. With its friends and family rate benefit, Mom can invite family members to play with her at the member rate with some restrictions. We are keeping our fingers crossed that the weather cooperates and so far the forecast looks great for golfing.

If you think Mom would prefer to kick back and relax on Mother’s Day we have something special planned in The Grill Room, too. Our restaurant, located in the clubhouse, has a Mother’s Day menu with entrée specials the whole family is sure to enjoy. Dinner will be served from 1 – 5pm with a complimentary champagne cocktail for Mom. Items from the Pub menu are also available to suit all members of the family, including those with any diet restrictions. Reservations are accepted and can be made by calling 973-697-8688.

Here are the featured entrée specials for Mother’s Day

For other Mother’s Day gift ideas, the pro shop carries a large range of women’s apparel and new this season, we’ve added clothing by Sunice, a Canadian manufacturer of quality outerwear.  Range finders, golf shoes, and special orders on clubs round out the choices and with a quick turnaround time, it’s easy to custom order your gear.

If mom is a golfer, you might also want to consider getting her a gift card to use towards a future round of golf at Bowling Green. Gift cards are offered in denominations of $50, $100, or $250 and can be purchased on our website here. You can also purchase a gift card in person from the Bowling Green Pro Shop.

Bowling Green Golf Club wishes moms and their families everywhere a very Happy Mother’s Day and we hope that you are spending it with the ones you love.

If you want to receive updates on future events and specials at The Grill Room sign up for our e-newsletter!

This Memorial Day will mark Bowling Green’s 45^th Anniversary season and to celebrate we are giving away 45 FREE rounds of golf at one of New Jersey’s most beautiful golf courses!

Starting May 1, 2012 you can enter to win one of forty-five free 18-hole rounds of golf. There is no purchase necessary, no blackout dates and it’s simple to enter the give-away!  You can click below and enter the sweepstakes on the Bowling Green website, or you can fill out an entry form in person at Bowling Green Golf Club or at the Willowbrook Golf Center.

On June 4, we will conduct a random drawing to select the 45 winners. Winners will be contacted via telephone and/or email and the names of the winners will be posted on bowlinggreengolf.com. You can read all of the give-away details here.

Bowling Green Golf Club was the brainchild of Albert Riggs & June Salmon in the mid-1960s and despite some skepticism from the golfing community that said the location was too far removed from “civilization” construction began in 1965.  The course opened for business in 1967 on a plot of land in Oak Ridge, NJ that was once a thriving dairy farm.  Evidence of the past is still visible just beyond the fifth green where the barn resides which now serves as the golf course’s maintenance building. From the onset, creating a relaxed family atmosphere was important to the Riggs family and soon thereafter Bowling Green gained a reputation for it’s narrow, pine tree lined fairways and its inviting, country atmosphere.

The land has been in the Riggs family for over 175 years and is still family owned and operated by Wil Riggs, grandson of founder Albert Riggs & Thom Bishop, Director of Golf, who has been with Bowling Green for so many years he’s a member of the family. Albert Riggs, Bowling Green’s founder, still lives in the home he was born in across the street from the golf course.

It’s been a great 45 years and we are excited to be sharing this landmark year with our customers and kick off what we expect to be another great 45 years. We couldn’t have done it without you!

Don’t forget to enter for your chance to win!!

At Bowling Green Golf Club we take pride in providing private club playing conditions on a semi-private course. Superintendent, Ernie Headley’s primary job is to maintain consistency of playing conditions throughout the year.  To that end, he monitors the health of the golf course environment through careful observation, diagnosis of disease and treatment of injury to the fairway, tee and green areas, as well as the bunkers, water hazards, and wooded areas.

Maintaining a healthy golf course landscape is both an art and a science and requires a wealth of knowledge and experience. Mr. Headley brings a unique set of skills to the job. He grew up on a local farm and learned about growing hay, corn, and ultimately grass, from his father. He is also able to fix any machine in the barn and in his spare time, he keeps a small herd of Ayrshire cattle just up the road from the golf course.

Weather is the most important factor when it comes to maintaining favorable course conditions. Our mild winter and warmer than normal March allowed the maintenance crew to complete projects ahead of time. Check them out below.

Course Conditions Improvements

• We constructed a new tee on the 3^rd hole, which presents an interesting new angle on this par 3 and allows us to have a backup tee when we begin renovation on the regular tee next fall.  The new tee has been sodded and will be ready for play by early summer.

• We cleaned out and repaired a drainage swale on the 11^th hole with a more eye pleasing bed of rocks.

• We leveled and reseeded the uneven area of rough between the 11^th tee and 12^th fairway.

• We prepped the 14^th hole for the installation of a drain on the 14^th green late in the Fall

• For the first time in our history, with the completion of work on the 13^th hole, we have renovated all 56 of our bunkers.

It’s greening up right before our eyes!

Nonetheless, with a little moisture and a warmer soil temperature, the greens will take off for the season. At that time, we implement maintenance practices that will provide great conditions through the summer months. This includes fertilization and  & verticutting of the greens.

One of the almost 200 fairway drains installed over the last three years. We regularly trim the turf around the drains to maintain maximum drainage

The maintenance crew makes repairing areas that show wear due to high traffic part of their daily routine depressions and uneven areas are filled with new earth and re-sodded.  Having our own sod nursery, as well as a nursery green, makes this easy to accomplish.

Since proper drainage of the fairways and greens is essential for providing consistent playing conditions, we have been making improvements to the course drainage system for the past several seasons These improvements made a noticeable difference when we received 11.5 inches of rain last September. Motivated by our success with fairway drains, we completed three drains on the 8^th green in 2011. We anticipate working on the 14^th & 15^th greens in the off-season this year.

If you’d like to get updates on course conditions from Ernie, stay connected with Bowling Green on facebook and twitter or visit our website at bowlinggreengolf.com/Course-Conditions.

Yesterday, on April 18, 2012 representatives from We Are Golf hosted the fifth annual National Golf Day in Washington D.C. with the purpose of engaging industry stakeholders through a nationwide awareness campaign about the economic, philanthropic, and environmental contributions of the sport.

Led by the Club Managers Association of America, the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America, the National Golf Course Owners Association, and The PGA of America, We Are Golf is a coalition formed to showcase golf’s various businesses, employees, tax revenues generation, tourism-building, philanthropy efforts, and the environmental benefits it provides.

In 2011 We Are Golf representatives met with members of Congress and communicated the profound impact that golf has on our nation’s economy, the 2 million job opportunities¹ it provides and the environmental stewardship it promotes. Most importantly, legislation was introduced in both the House and the Senate to establish permanent, national tax relief in the wake of disasters that would remove the exclusion for public or private golf courses (current state-specific disaster relief funds exclude golf courses). Some photos from the 2011 Nation Golf Day event hosted on Capital Hill can be found here.

On National Golf Day 2012 a continued effort was made to reach out to golf industry partners through a nationwide awareness campaign. One major push will be the passing of the National Disaster Relief Bill introduced in 2011 without exclusion for public and private golf courses. We Are Golf representatives also hope to be involved with legislation related to the Americans with Disabilities Act, such as single rider carts for disabled golfers.

If you are wondering how you can get involved, visit twitter.wearegolf.org and tweet why golf is more than just a game to you. We Are Golf will share the tweets and diverse stories about golf’s impact on individuals, families, businesses and the greater community around the country with lawmakers. You can also change your twitter background to support National Golf Day and interact with We Are Golf on facebook to let them know what the golf industry means to you.

What does being a member of the golf industry mean to Bowling Green? First and foremost we are proud to provide a first job opportunity to the youth of Jefferson Township. The routine operations of a daily fee course are supported by a variety of entry-level part-time jobs, which teenagers are well suited. From these first part-time jobs teenagers will learn their first skills in fulfilling an employer’s expectations.  In addition to these part-time employment opportunities, there are also several levels of quality full-time employment made possible by our golf course business.

A golf course is also a good neighbor: providing a large property tax ratable while maintaining a contiguous green open space in the community. The environment reaps the benefits from the preserved open space of a golf course. Over the last 45 years, wildlife has flourished on the Bowling Green course. This past decade, our concern has been a lack of recognition by municipal and county authorities of the benefits we provide to our community vis-à-vis the tax paying enterprise that is Bowling Green. It’s the same lack of recognition on a national level We Are Golf is seeking to redress within the National Disaster Relief Bill. Inclusion of golf course businesses, both public and private, in a disaster relief bill will bring recognition to their economic impact and to the importance of sustaining the industry’s jobs.

In addition to these important economic contributions, the New Jersey section of the PGA reports that over 16,000 golf facilities nationwide serve as the access points for charitable fundraising by local & national organizations².  On a local level, Bowling Green gives generously to non-profit community fundraisers.

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¹Source: http://wearegolf.org/about

²Source: NJSGA Golf Early summer 2011, President’s message (Bryan Jones) NJ State Golf Association magazine

Welcome back! Can you believe we greeted our first golfers on March 8^th with almost no winter? We’re looking forward to seeing all of you this golf season, and boy do we have some fun things in store for you! We’re in a party mood as we will be celebrating our 45^th anniversary this Memorial Day weekend and we’ll be announcing ways that you can share this milestone with us soon!

We start this 45^th anniversary season with a salute and farewell to Geoff Cornish, architect of Bowling Green and well known for designing classic courses throughout New England.  Geoff passed away at the age of 97 in February. We owe our old school layout to his design.

In keeping with the Tee It Forward initiative, we’ve created two new tee combos at 6000 and 6400 yards for friendlier scoring on the course. In fact, we’re already receiving favorable feedback.    Give the shorter distances a try and you’ll be hitting short irons into the greens just like the Pros.

You’ll also notice we’ve built a new tee on the 3^rd hole. Having an alternate tee on the 3^rd hole allows us to work on the regular tee this fall. The new tee won’t be ready till early summer but the plans are to rotate this 140 – 150-yard tee shot into the lineup for men and women.

After you play, kick back in The Grill Room to recap your round over a cold beverage. The Grill Room is open daily from 11am until 9pm serving from a Pub menu Sunday – Thursday and full dinner menu on Friday & Saturday evenings.

After you play, please let us know what you think by commenting on our Facebook page, @ us on twitter @BGGolfClubNJ or tell Pete in the pro shop. We will also keep you posted with updates on course conditions, pro golf tips, pro golf tournament commentary, and news and events happening at Bowling Green and the Grill Room, so make sure to follow us!

In just a week or so our League play gets into full swing, a sure sign that the golf season has started. Golf Pro George Heslin is about to start his six week Spring Junior Golf Clinic  and our two resident high school golf teams, Jefferson & West Milford, are in action now, too.  So when you arrive for your first visit of the season, you’ll be swept up in golf fever 2012!

Another big change you may notice is our new logo! We redesigned our logo to give it a contemporary feel; incorporating the gentle contours of our classically designed golf course as well as the contour of our namesake, Bowling Green Mountain, viewed down the 1^st hole. Let us know what you think of it in the comments!

Come see us soon. The golf season is in full swing at Bowling Green!