Woodland management

What a difference a few days can make, last Saturday we woke up to the snow and by Friday morning, following a slow thaw we have glorious sunshine. The temperatures are still low but this is perfect for golf at least.

The course was closed from Saturday to Wednesday due at first the snow but then the sheets of ice that appeared because the snow melt during the day and the frosts at night.

We decided to postpone the Divot Trophy as the temperatures were to low and because of the weather we were unable to scarify the fairways as planned the week before, meaning if we did carry out this operation the chances are most would be removed during the process (especially
blowing the fairways clear). Please keep an eye for this event as we need numbers. It's good competition and a great way to help your course.

During the week we carried out some subtle woodland management. This word can strike fear into every golfer but the works were essential to move the course into the right direction and speed up play.
Remember the woodlands that are sustainable are managed woodlands.

•We have reduce the bush back right of 8th to speed up play from 6th Tee, leaving the holly bush.
•Removed some Hornbeam from the ditch on the left of 15th to get a better view of the hole.
• Pruned back the Oakes over hanging the 12th and 10th greens ( we do this every two years) so you can hit the greens better and improve light/air to the greens also.
•Reduced the hedges to make them easier to maintain in the future.

The bigger logs were used to create log piles or stacks in the woodland areas out of play. We do this for our ecology reasons as they break down they become perfect homes for bugs and grubs including stag beetles. Once these start to appear it encourages the birds to the golf course. We have seen a particular rise in Green Woodpeckers over the last three years. All of these things make a more natural environment and better place to enjoy our golf.

We also cleared the last few leafs from ditches, edged the last couple of bunkers, carried on refurbishing course furniture, repaired some of the drainage that had collapsed during the last wet spell.

I hope you all have a chance to play over Easter and we hope the temperatures will rise up in the coming days.

Happy Easter to you all

Winters back

The Spring equinox, which marks the beginning of spring in the northern hemisphere, was on March 20th. This normally means the day light and night time hours are equal and the grass gets greener as more photosynthesis is used by the plant. Not this weekend... Like most of you I woke up to a snow covered scene on Saturday morning and the golf course closed because of this. I will up load a couple of picture I took when walking round the course on Sunday morning. The good news being I don't think this will hang around for to long unlike previous snow. We have between 1-2 inches in places and very little under trees. We are forecast more today (Sunday) but we are due a westerly wind towards the end of the week meaning WARM air!
So for now, I must be patient as I know the summer is just around the corner!

Course Maintenance Week

As I sit here writing our blog, I look out on the snowy ground, I think of last springs course maintenance week. I remember getting sunburnt, needing to drink lots of water and using the irrigation system. This spring however is completely different story.
Following a very wet weekend I wasn't sure whether we would even start on Monday morning. I admit I was very impressed with the way the greens had drained by Monday morning allowing us to start work on them.
On Monday and Tuesday after the frosts we closed nine greens (front 9 Monday, back 9 Tuesday). We did this so that we would not be interrupted during our work schedule and more importantly the golfer would not have to wait around or play on target greens.
We started by double Verti cutting the greens, this removes some of the thatch and any grass is lying down, helping to stand it up.
Next we top dressed ( we applied 20 tonnes to all the greens). Then we Verti drained to 10 inches and Pro cored to 4 inches. Both these machines had solid tines on them ( like a fork).
The reason for the two types of aeration is quite simple, the depth of 10 inches helps to break up compaction allowing air and sand as deep as possible. The second pass at 5 inches helps close up the holes made by the Verti drain meaning the greens are smoother as these tines are smaller and again more sand and air are given to the soil profile. This will help the surfaces breath following a wet winter, improve the greens drainage and dilute any thatch build up lower down.
We then followed the two aeration passes with an organic fertiliser. The greens were then brushed, this brushes the top dressing and fertiliser into all the holes made and leaves the surfaces clean and smooth. The last link in our little chain was to vibe roll the greens ( iron) this makes them flatter ,giving the golfer a better green to putt on.
Once the greens were finished we then carried out Verti draining to all our aprons, again these were Verti cut and top dressed. The surrounds were also spiked to 4 inches using our Sisis spiker. We will work more on these areas once the weather improves (if that ever happens)!
Our attentions then turned to our tees. These were Verti drained and then scarified to -5 mm. Next week if the snow lifts we plan to top dress these areas and fertilise including the surrounds, aprons and tees.
Other jobs achieved this week- Some of our hedges were reduced in height to make them more manageable, the removal of some branches and lower limbs to add more light to some of the tees (e.g 8th whites). We also started to work on the newly installed bunkers, they were edged and minor repairs were made to any problem areas. We then spent a bit of time collecting the debris that had fallen from the trees from the strong winds of late. We filled 6 trailer loads of stuff and we could possibly end up with more if the wind kicks up again.

To summarise, another busy week for the greenstaff. With over 80% of our plans for the course maintenance completed in a week that I didn't think we would be able to do much was great. I must say well done to all the greenstaff for working so hard and putting in the extra hours to get these things done.

Next week, if this mini snow storm ends we will try to get some more renovations of the tees and fairways done including the Divot Trophy on Friday. Please sign up in the bar or by calling the office.

Many thanks
Matt Plested

Bunker renovation and St Patricks

Last week was a very strange week, especially the weather. We had all the seasons rolled into one. In one day we had frost, sun, rain, wind, snow and hail!

The main aim of the week from a greenkeeping point of view was to carry out our bunker renovations. This would not include the new bunkers ( that are a few weeks away from being ready) but all the others. Some of the old bunkers needed to be pumped out because they don't have drainage or a least drainage that function correctly. These bunkers will be replaced during our next phase of works with new drainage added.
We edged the bunkers back just slightly using edging irons (old school), this process does take longer but it gives us a great start to a season and makes it easier to maintain. We also hand dug the edges out and removed the small shelves that were appearing in some of the bunkers. These were not major like the ones we dug out with the digger a few weeks but just subtle little bumps that would stop the ball from returning down the bank.
Next we checked the sand levels and topped the sand up in the bunkers that required it. The bunkers were then compacted and raked ready for play.

At the end of the week we managed to get the greens, aprons, tees and fairways cut as they had dried off enough meaning we could get the course ready for the St Patricks day golf. Unfortunately mother nature wanted to test us yet again bringing heavy rain (13mm) over night and more in the morning. We doubled our normal weekend staff numbers on Saturday and managed to get the course open, we did have some target greens but at least we were able to play and enjoy the great day. I think the weather played right into the hands of the Irish and they ended up winning by 1038 points to the Rest Of the Worlds 1025!!

My next blog will be about course Maintenance week. Lets hope the weather holds off...

A finishing off week

This is what I call 'A finishing off week' this is exactly what it says,we try to get loads of little jobs finished off!

At the start of the week I was so impressed with the way the course was drying out, I even started to worry about the plant wilting. I carried out my normal moisture tests and soil temperature test to see how the grass plant was doing. The moisture levels had gone down to 30%. Anything below 25% we would start to look at applying some water. I can't remember the last time the levels got that low. The soil temperatures were around 4.4 again this is very low for the time of year and this means that there will be practically no growth. Soil temperature (not air) need to be between 6-9• depending on the grass plant for good growth. The growth rates seem to be about four weeks behind at the moment. This feeling might be me just thinking of last years super hot March (which triggered the hose pipe ban). I am hoping we get some warm dry weather soon...

This dry start to the week allowed us to get the course cut and finally chance to get the drain across the 7th trenched. This was then piped, stoned and topped up with root zone. We have had to wait a while for this due to the wet conditions but it will be worth it. We will carry out more drainage in this area during the late end of the season but for now I just want to get jobs finished off and get the course ready for the coming season.

Another job we finished off this week,was the topping up of soil and seed to all the tree stump areas that were left below ground level when they were ground out. These areas were over seeded with fescue to match the rest of the roughs. These areas will remain white lined until the seed is through and we are happy with the sward coverage.

During the middle of the week I took full advantage of the dry spell to aerate the greens. We only vented them really (this means aeration above 4 inches). This will help the roots by allowing them to breath air and improve the soil by adding air to the structure. We then rolled the green after with the new Toro turf Iron we had on demo. We hoped by doing this the surface disruption would be kept to a minimum.

As the weather turned back to the wet /cold that we have become accustomed to of late, especially Friday with over 20mm of rain falling we turned our attentions to finishing of the varnishing of the course markers and getting them finished for the season. We also started to sand down the ball washers ready for there new paint job.
Doing this to all of our course furniture brings them back to life and helps keep the course looking good.

By getting all these little things finished off makes me think the season is just around the corner and I can't wait, bring on the sunshine!!

Another busy DRY week!

This week we have officially welcomed the spring, the temperatures have still been a bit low due to the easterly wind but the day light is improving everyday. I have also noticed the Willow trees are just starting to bud and the Daffodils are starting to come up. This means summer is just round the corner and I can not wait!

Also this week I have mentioned we have finished the drainage on the 2nd and 3rd, we have also installed an extension to the 4th pathway near the new bunkers. This area had become very muddy due to the high traffic levels, mainly caused by the construction works on the hole forcing all the golfers through one exit.

Another sign that we are coming out of the winter was the first application of fertiliser to the greens, a nice little feed just to kick the growth off. This will help with the differential growth between the Bent and Poa grass species, meaning smoother greens earlier. Also the sight of the sprayer out spraying iron on the fairways to help strengthen the plant and knock the moss before we scarify them in a couple of weeks. If you have seen the white foam blobs on the fairways, don't worry it's just a soapy foam used by us to see where we have sprayed. This stops
double application (waste of money), minimises damage to the plants and waste (better for the environment).