Course Report – May

Course Report

Some much needed rainfall has fallen over the past month with 109mm recorded for the month of April. Our Kikuyu program also kicked of with two scheduled chemical applications applied to all fairways on a 21 day interval. When you look back to 12 months ago when we commenced the program we had several bare areas in the fairways as a result of spraying out the Kikuyu – 11 and 14 fairways in particular had large bare and muddy areas through the winter months. Fast forward 12 months and although we still have Kikuyu out there its not to the same extent, we are winning the battle and we need to remind ourselves that this is a marathon and not a sprint but the results are looking very promising and we are confident that we are on the right track to achieving our phase 1 goal of removing Kikuyu from within our priority 1 areas (Tee’s, fairways, green collars and approaches)  within the 24m month time period.

After the South West Open our focus will turn to our tee tops, tee surrounds and thicker areas within the rough. Our complicated areas of spraying are around our greens with a mixture of different grasses, chemical applications will decimate areas of turf resulting in large bare areas and heading into winter these areas will turn muddy and boggy. Our aim for these areas is a gradual approach over the warmer months focusing on a couple of holes at a time and will rely on a mixture of boom spraying and spot spraying different chemical combinations.  

 

As we talk about progress, we recently did a 12 month follow up test on Nematode populations within our greens. Although numbers within the rootzone area are still high – in fact 146 sting nematode within a 200ml sample (threshold is 10) our numbers are drastically lower than the 421 in a 200ml sample 12 months earlier. As a result of lower numbers, we are seeing increased turf and root health, although still not perfect we are building root mass and while we keep building on that and driving those roots deeper we will start getting some resilience from the turf and the impact of nematodes will be less. Unfortunately, we will probably never fully eradicate these and for good reason, gone are the days where you can drop a nuclear bomb of a chemical down and completely wipe out anything that lives so again it’s a slow tedious approach to managing numbers, introducing different microbial colonies and fungi’s that effect nematode populations, addition of bio stimulants and all other really cool stuff… Now who ever said growing grass is boring??

 

We are about to take delivery on some new pieces of equipment at any moment now, these were ordered in the latter half of last year. we will receive a new mechanical bunker rake along with 2 new greens rollers. At present the current bunker rake is 12 years old and the greens roller is 11 years old although there have been several modifications, rebuilds, retro fitting you name it it’s had it. The bonus of now having 2 rollers as opposed to the running just a single roller is that we can now send both rollers out on each 9 to stay in front of the field.

As part of this machinery order we are still waiting on 2 new lithium powered greens mowers and last report these have been built and are currently getting loaded onto a boat over in the UK and due to set sail early May – so hopefully we are looking at a July delivery date and lucky for us, just in time for when we experience next to no growth!! However, when they do arrive these mowers will be a great addition to the fleet and their quality of cut is next level and that’s why they are regarded as the best greens mowers on the market by a long shot so exciting times are coming.

 

Looking ahead works are about to commence on concreting the 2^nd path, works will be similar to the 14^th and will include turfing and the addition of a small limestone wall/kerb up by the Blue and white tee. With the South West Open approaching quickly our attentions are starting to focus on that with course preparation and presentation starting to ramp up.

Until next time

Dave Brennan

Course Superintendent.