That time of year is upon us, dark mornings, evenings drawing in, leaves starting to fall and so the storey goes. There has been a fair bit going on since my last blog (which was over 2 months ago, my apologies). In my last blog i mentioned the disease Fusarium, at the time of writing that blog we had a pretty bad outbreak. We managed to get that under control and recovery has been steady with some scares still visible. We are now into our preventative fungicide spraying programme. Any disease we get now will struggle to recover. A monthly foliar feed to keep them ticking over through the winter. I spray our fertilizer (Plant protection) on the greens in 2 different ways, soil feed and foilar feed. A foliar feed being a fine spray jet with a small droplet in minimum amount of water (250 litres - 300 litres). We foliar feed when we want the product to enter directly into the leaf of the plant for a quick uptake. e.g. when the plant is not actively growing, pre tournament or when the product specifies. Soil feeding is exactly what it says, we spray a larger droplet so it runs off the leaf into the canopy (400 litres - 500 litres). The products need to work in the surface/thatch layer or is required to be taken up by the root. Plenty of top dressing will hopefully be applied during the winter. This proved successful last year and has helped keep the green firm through the recent monsoons we have been having.
Bunker Project
Profusion came in on the 3rd October to start renovating the greenside bunkers on 8th, 9th & 10th. The bunker work was over seen by Peter Jones our agronomist. All the shaping was completed by 9th October and signed off by Peter. Drainage came next. All new drainage trenches were added to 300mm, 100m perforated pipe was laid in the drain lines then topped up with 10mm shingle and finally capped off with sharp sand to stop any migration of stone. All soak aways were placed outside bunkers in case of any issues. The next stage was to lay upside down turf into the bunkers. This helps to stop and migration of stones into the sand. Next came the reveted turf. It was placed around the outside of the bunker to the shape we required. We use the same reveted turf that is used on a links bunker especially grown for this at 30mm thick. This gives us a sharper more defined edge to the bunker. Keeping the edges solid and stopping the edges from collapsing. Turf was then laid using Tillers Arena turf, this is an all rye grass mixture to complement the existing surrounding turf. Sand was then placed into the bunkers, 75mm on the faces and 100mm across all the playing areas. Compacted with a compactor plate. The turf should take approximately 3-4 weeks to root. We will remove the rope when we feel the turf is rooted enough to take footfall, re-compact the bases and back in play. Peter Jones signed off the bunkers on 17th October. I think you will all agree Profusion have again done a outstanding job considering the weather we had to contend with. We have a few areas to tidy up to side of the course where vehicles have been tracking backwards and forward.
Greens Aeration
The time of year has arrived to do our autumn aeration. In years gone by we would have solid tined the greens with a 12mm tine to a depth of 10 inches, recovery would typically be 6 - 10 days. This year we tried a machine called the Air 2g2. This is far less invasive but giving us the same results if not better. The aim of aerating this time of year is to provide drainage holes to take any surface water away and down into the profile, to create fissures in the sub soil to allow the roots to develop, help remove toxic anaerobic gases but most of all to relieve compaction from machinery and footfall. The Air 2g2 aerator works using 3 probes. A 12 inch probe in the middle with 2 six inch probes on the out side approximately 50 cm apart. The probes are injected into the green and air is expelled under high pressure cracking the soil below giving us the fissures we require. This process is less invasive to golfers and also less aggressive for us. Other weak/wet areas have been done including all the wet approaches and tees. Follow the link for more information http://www.campeyturfcare.com/exclusiveproducts/gt-air-inject.htm
Other News
The winter mat on the 12th tee has been moved to the bottom tier. We just need to dig out the base up the top and re turf ( i am waiting to have a few turfing jobs on the go so i can order in bulk). Leaves have started to fall in earnest now so we are continuously blowing and collecting leaves. The gorse bushes in the 11th have been trimmed and strimmed around. A base has been installed by Profusion for a winter tee on 9th. The proposed winter tee on 13th was too close to the gas main running through the course so we will have to rethink the positioning of that tee.
Going forwards the two holy bushes will be removed on the 12th bank to help the ladies and seniors (in my opinion they should all be removed). I have obtained quotes to take the tree line back on the right of the 3rd and 14th. Taking this back will allow us to use the right hand side of the tees. Waiting on the board for a decision on that. We are going to attempt to refurbish the 10th sleeper bunker. Shortening the width of it, re draining, re sanding and re turfing the whole of the bottom.
Plenty of tree work and scrub removal to be done through the winter winter. A 8mm pencil tine in 2 weeks time will complete our winter aeration on the greens.
My thanks goes to the guys at Profusion and my team (who helped for most of the project) for the huge effort they put in complete the bunker project. A big thank you to you the members for your patience and respecting the work done on the bunkers by keeping off of the turf.
Thank you for reading
Lee & Green Keeping Team
Going forwards the two holy bushes will be removed on the 12th bank to help the ladies and seniors (in my opinion they should all be removed). I have obtained quotes to take the tree line back on the right of the 3rd and 14th. Taking this back will allow us to use the right hand side of the tees. Waiting on the board for a decision on that. We are going to attempt to refurbish the 10th sleeper bunker. Shortening the width of it, re draining, re sanding and re turfing the whole of the bottom.
Plenty of tree work and scrub removal to be done through the winter winter. A 8mm pencil tine in 2 weeks time will complete our winter aeration on the greens.
My thanks goes to the guys at Profusion and my team (who helped for most of the project) for the huge effort they put in complete the bunker project. A big thank you to you the members for your patience and respecting the work done on the bunkers by keeping off of the turf.
Thank you for reading
Lee & Green Keeping Team