August Update

Good afternoon everyone. It has been a busy month maintaining the course with 4 staff,  so as you may expect we have concentrated on getting the basics done. Growth rates have slowed enough in the outfield allowing us to cut only the areas necessary in the rough and striping of the fairways once a week. Progress has however been made on recruiting a new member of staff and all being well the successful candidate will be with us in the coming weeks. 

We have recently had the new irrigation control panel installed which will enable us to program a nightly watering of the greens and or tees. This has been a godsend as valuable time was spent watering the greens by hand late into the night. We have a couple of teething troubles but they should be rectified shortly. As you may have seen we experienced areas of dry patch following the high heat early in the month which had quickly became hydrophobic. The greens were spot treated with one of the strongest wetting agents on the market to rehydrate the dry patch. We followed this application with another wetting agent and seaweed biostimulant to strengthen the plant.

Maintenance week began on the Sunday afternoon deep tining the greens. The heavier Verti Drain was used to aerate with 12mm solid tines to a depth of 350mm. There appears to be a deep solid pan beneath some of the greens that requires breaking through to aid water percolation through the soil profile. Once all the greens were aerated the greens were then top dressed and brushed. A second pass of the greens this time with the Wiedenmann with 12mm solid tines set at a depth of 100mm to aid recovery and smooth the surface from the heavier verti drain. We then brushed again and double ironed the greens. A granular feed of Terralift Tx10 has since been applied to encourage regrowth and fully recover the putting surfaces. There are a few thin patches on the greens which will be overseeded with Agrostis (Bent) seed when time allows. It took just 2.5 days to complete greens maintenance and so the greens were back in play on the Wednesday morning. 

We have also addressed a few issues with presentation by trying to cut the long stalky growth on the tee tops and some off the fairways. This was done using the rough rotary deck to its lowest height of cut possible. The car park surrounds have been sprayed with a total weedkiller to improve the club environs. 

In the coming weeks we will be attending to flailing the ditch banks, hedge rows and cleaning out the ditches with a hired excavator. Aeration and fertilising of the tee tops will be completed to prepare them for the winter months. Hummocks will be cut and cleared and ponds will also be cleared of the excessive weed growth. 

Gareth Williams
Course Director