Course Report – January

Over the festive period it’s been business as usual out on the course. The strong easterly winds are proving difficult with irrigation coverage along with the amount of leaves and debris littering the course. Unfortunately there isn’t a great deal more we can do about the leaves and contrary to some members beliefs we do actually pick up and clear leaves several times through out the week. It is a very time consuming and tedious task and at times when we have been out there trying to get it done amongst play (social) we often field comments regarding noise or dust which makes the task that little bit more difficult.

 

The 8^th green is coming along, still waiting on some of the rough to thicken up a little bit to better handle the traffic when the time comes to open the hole for play – we are still looking around the week leading into the Australia day weekend. 

 

We will be bidding farewell to one of our members of the team in the next few weeks with Mick Hancock deciding to move on. Mick with his wife have recently bought into a local Bunbury business and will look to devote his time and effort into growing the business.  In 2021Mick originally signed on for a 2 day a week role and that has now grown into 4-5 days plus the weekend work. He has been an extremely valuable and popular member of the team and we wish him all the best on his new business ventures. 

Our apprentice and cottage resident Ryan Dye will also be packing his bags in March and heading over to Texas for whirlwind visit to assist with preparations for the 2024 Valero Texas Open. The experience Ryan will gain from this this trip is invaluable to not only himself but also to the club as he prepares for the US8.9mil event. For me personally I have been lucky enough to be involved with these events and its something we like to push onto our apprentices. Former member of the team Connor Butlion worked the 2018 Byron Nelson which was also in Texas along with doing the 2020 US Open at Winged foot , but was unfortunately scrapped due to the Covid pandemic. Ryan doesn’t know it yet but he will be doing an exclusive report for the crier on his experience. 

 

Returning back to the course, the next couple of weeks will be focused on the lead up to the Australia Day weekend along with the everyday maintenance and course prep. At the beginning of February we will commence our kikuyu spraying with 3 applications planned. This will be a different group of chemicals applied hence the summer applications. We do expect some browning off  may occur to the fairways after the 1^st application but this is generally cosmetic and they will bounce back quickly.  The 2^nd chemical will be applied twice at 7 day intervals and this shouldn’t cause any issues. 

 

As always plenty happening out on the course,  so until next time… try and keep it on the green stuff.

Dave Brennan

Course Superintendent.