The Oakview Golf and Country Club near Gretna is again dealing with a water shortage.

A lack of normal rainfall this year has forced the club to use a significant amount of water from its reservoir, so in order to conserve the precious commodity, the club has restricted all watering operations to its greens and tee boxes only.

"Our greens look unbelievable. Our grounds crew has done a phenomenal job and I can't say enough about what they've done for the golf course in making it look great. At the same time, you can also tell there's a water shortage because the fairways are getting a little brown, but that's what happens with water conservation," explains club president Craig Neufeld.

Expanding the Oakview reservoir may be an option

Neufeld says the board has formed a water committee to explore all options for dealing with these kinds of dry years.

"The water committee will work with the Rhineland municipality and the surrounding area to see what we can do to conserve some of the water and perhaps increase our water supply ... so that this does not become a recurring problem in future years."

Expanding the reservoir would be one option, but it's also a costly one.

"We want to look a number of options such as a larger reservoir or perhaps dig out part of the creek behind the 8th hole to create a larger area to get water from."

Neufeld points out that, while they are looking for a long term solution, they will need to act fairly quickly if they want to maintain a viable golf club into the future.