Course maintenance update for November. 

November has been a really wet month with a total rainfall figure of 176mm, compared to last November's total of 55mm. This excessive amount of rainfall  made it difficult to start some of our winter programme work.

The temperature throughout the month has been above average allowing the grass to keep growing , in fact we recorded only two days of frost over the period.

 Throughout the heavy rainfall the greens team have been kept busy with greens tees, and fairway aeration. The drainage outlets have been monitored regularly to maximize water flow off the course. And we've continued with the leaf clearance and bunker maintenance.


New Toro equipment.

In early November we took delivery of a new fleet of Toro machinery from our local dealers Cheshire Turf Machinery. These machines enable the greens team to present the course to a high standard throughout the year.I would like to thank the members and board of directors for investing in this quality turf care equipment .

Tees aeration.            

Our regular programme of aeration as continued on all of our surfaces, the picture below shows  deep aeration on our tees.                                                                                                                

Bunker Maintenance.

We've used the tiller regularly to keep the sand loose. But unfortunately the rainfall has been so heavy it as compacted the sand . We will continue to use the tiller to get the bunkers back to a better playing quality. Pictured below is Daniel Gildea operating the tiller.

Pitch marks on the Greens. 

PITCH MARKS.

Your Greenkeepers aim to produce quality surfaces. We try to produce greens that offer smooth ball roll for the well struck putt.
 But unfortunately if pitch marks are not repaired it is difficult to achieve the pure surface we all strive for .      
                              Could ALL golfers please repair their PITCH MARKS

December work programme. 

Has usual the weather conditions play a large part in our work programme.If the conditions allow we will start work on bunker reconstruction at the 14th green side and cross bunker at the 6th green.

We've  opened up the area behind the practice nets, that we aim to develop into a chipping area. This area needs to be cleared and shaped.

 Lower branches on the trees down the 11th hole will be selectively pruned,and aeration will continue on all surfaces. General course preparation will continue throughout the month.

                                                                            Terry Wharton         Head Greenkeeper  

October Update.

Welcome to our blog,the weather in October allowed us to solid tine the greens and complete our top dressing programme for the year.

 We also applied a preventative fungicide spray to control a potential onset of Fusarium Patch.
Fusarium is a turf disease that can be damaging to the greens killing the plant, creating patches on the surfaces which affects the smoothness and aesthetics of the greens.  
The weather conditions throughout October were ideal for its development with the warm,humid weather favoring an outbreak.

The 7th gents tee was levelled and turfed, and the back tee at the 8th was levelled and over seeded, similar to the work we completed on the 4th tee last year.

 The picture shows our sweep and fill brush working the top dressing in to the canopy of the greens turf.

The brush is very effective and after a couple of passes the dressing is worked in to the tine holes.

 This action allows the dressing to fill the tine holes and enables good ball roll to be achieved with minimal surface disturbance.



Drainage work at the 15th green

 Early October we started draining the 15th green. Overall the green performs well throughout most of the year.

 However in periods of heavy rain the drainage qualities were slow in removing the water,

 It was decided to put a complete new drainage system into the green and surround.

We used an AFT trencher to dig out the drainage channels.

The machine gave us a neat finish allowing for minimal disturbance to the playing surface.

The picture on the right shows the main drain cut out with the laterals in position.

Levels are checked throughout the work, and the pipe work and joints are positioned in the trenches.

The trenches are back filled with 6 /10 mm drainage stone and topped up with a root zone compost.

 To reduce any sinkage in the trenches the stone and rootzone are firmed down before the turf is put back in place.

Once the green is turfed we will allow it to root and settle down and monitor the surface levels.

We will  then use the Toro turf iron to roll the turf to aid settlement .


This work will be carried out over the next couple of months to achieve  smoothness on the surface






Removing leaves off the course.

Over the next couple of months we will

be blowing the leaves off the course.
The tractor mounted blower does a great job,especially when the wind is in a favorable direction.

 With the blower positioned on the three point linkage of the tractor it allows us to remove  the leaves with minimal marking to the turf.

We also use the blower in the growing season to blow the cut grass in the rough,giving us better presentation in the cut areas.


November work programme.

We hope to start work on bunker management in November alongside levelling up the 9th gents tee.
The course preparation will continue if the weather stays mild  with cutting raking, aeration,and leaf blowing keeping us busy.  ( Weather Permitting!!!!!)                                      
                                                                             
                                                                   Terry Wharton    Head Greenkeeper

Welcome to our September blog.

The greens team have been busy throughout September completing and starting various work. The weather has allowed us to keep on track and progress was good.

 We've applied our last applications of plant growth regulator, followed up with our turf conditioner and wetting agent for this year.    Below are pictures showing the numerous works.

Aeration

 The regular aeration programme on the greens.

Contractors Mallinsons have Vertidrained our fairways.

The soil conditions were perfect giving great results.  After a light roll and cut it was difficult to see any surface disturbance.



Mounds Management


The heavy growth on the mounds has been cut short to weaken the heavy grasses. We aim to encourage finer grass to enable balls to be found,and speed up play.

Weak areas on the mounds will be seeded with bent grass seed to encourage finer grasses..

The picture on the right shows the mounds cut and all the grass raked and removed.

 Removing the cut grass reduces the available nutrients from the grass that would promote heavy course growth if left to break down.




Pond Conservation
 We've managed to start cleaning out some of the dense growth in the ponds. This work will allow the water from the drainage system to flow better and raise the aesthetics around the area.

The picture shows the greens team sympathetically removing the growth avoiding to harm any inhabitants. The weed will be left on the bankings for a short while to allow any pond life to make its way back in to the water before we remove it.













October Work Programme               

In early October we hope to solid tine and apply our last top dressing to the greens reaching our target of one hundred tonnes.

We will start our winter programme of leveling tees and draining the 15th green. Early October will see the greens team start our removal of leaves and continuing to maintain our high standards of course presentation.                            

                                                     Terry Wharton         Head Greenkeeper

Course update.

Welcome to our August blog,the weather has been kind to us and we have been able to complete the work that was planned for the month.

Soil Reliever             Greens Aeration


The soil and turf conditions were perfect for our aeration programme in the early part of August.

We opened up the greens with 12 mm solid tines to a depth of  175mm.

Each month the greens are aerated with the procore,but we felt that the soil reliever would give us a variation in depth.

This action would aid the root structure, benefit the air exchange and relieve surface tension of the soil structure.

We followed this up with the turf iron to smooth out the surfaces, After the rolling the surface was fine to putt on with great ball roll.






                                                 Overseeding the greens

We used the Vredo compact seeder to overseed the greens,using Johnsons J All Bent grass seed with cultivars Arrowtown and Manor.

 The machine cuts a slit at a depth of 5mm through the turf, the seed drops into the cut channel.

 The slit in the turf enables the seed to have good contact with the upper profile soils which will facilitate good germination . We noticed the first signs of the seed coming through after seven days.

 The Vredo machine was hired from Greener Grounds, who provided us with a first class service.

Soil Temperature/Germination.

The timing of the overseeding on the greens was important, we needed to have good soil temperature to enable the seed to germinate. The picture below shows our soil thermometer reading when we seeded the greens. The germination of the seed was aided by some moderate rain showers, giving us ideal conditions for germination.

This picture shows the putting green cut on the right hand side and the early morning dew on the left. You can see the germinating seed coming through from the double pass with the Vredo.

We did not change the cutting height, but have raised the front mounted brushes on the greens machines.

The results are very pleasing.

 Over a period of time using this method we will aim to boost the bent composition of grass species on the greens.










 September work programme 

We hope to cut the mounds and rake off the grass and overseed any weak areas with bent seed. We will also try to reduce the weed in the ponds at the 8th and 11th,

 Deep aeration work will begin on the fairways, and our usual work programme of course preparation.


                                                                               Terry Wharton  Head Greenkeeper

Welcome to our July blog.

The time is flying bye, we've been busy on various jobs throughout the month. As usual i'll  touch on the weather, and we all know it was disappointing with cool temperatures and heavy periods of rain!!!!

 We hope, August can give us some decent days.

We recently applied a top dressing to the greens, bringing our application amount up to 80 tonnes, our yearly target is 100 tonnes. We will reach our total over the next couple of months after deep aeration followed up with the applications.

 In previous blogs i have explained the benefits of top dressing and how it enables the greens surface to firm up , break down layers of fibre in the upper profile of the root zone, and creates soil conditions that drain well and allow the desirable bent grasses to develop.

The picture below shows member of the green's team Jack Hosker using the Toro 3250 greens machine towing the sweep and fill brush which was demonstrated by Cheshire Turf Machinery.

The brush system was brilliant and really worked the dressing into the sward leaving the surface great to putt on after the top dressing application.

Sweep and fill Brush System.

 Fairway work.

The Fairways have held up well this year.

 The regular vertidraining and the early season application spray of soluble iron checked any moss, they were scarified with the wessex machine, with this work setting them up nicely for the  season.


We constantly monitor areas of weed on the fairways surfaces, and try to produce a total grass sward to aid greater presentation.



The presentation of the fairways is so important, and this has been aided with the use of  divot bags which are positioned  at the 1st and 10th tees.

 The bags contain compost and seed that enable the golfers to fill in their divots and any others they may come across. The sign above the frame allows us to target various fairways throughout the week.

Pictured  below is our frame and divot bags at the 10th tee.

In August we hope to Vertidrain our greens and tees,top dress, apply our monthly applications of  plant growth regulator, conditioner and wetting agent. We aim to over seed our greens and continue with course presentation.


                                                                                    Terry Wharton  Head  Greenkeeper

Course update.

                                                                   

 Welcome to our June blog, we've had some warmer weather throughout the month, which has enabled us to catch up on our work programme.

 We have received our annual visit from Mr Alistair Beggs , Head of Agronomy and Ecology at the Sports Turf Research Institute.

Alistair reviewed conditions of the course and offered advice on ongoing management .















Performance data was taken from three indicator greens testing for soil moisture,organic matter content,firmness,speed, trueness and smoothness,and the chemical status of the upper profile.

Our aim is to produce greens that receive approach shots correctly then provide smooth/true and well paced surfaces for putting throughout the year.

 Regular rolling has been carried out on the greens with sensible cutting heights to enable us to achieve good green speed and surface smoothness.

Plant Growth Regulator

We are using a plant growth regulator on the greens and tees to improve the sward texture and density. The chemical encourages lateral rather than upward growth, producing a tight grass surface and a reduction in top growth. These applications will be applied throughout the growing season and be monitored.



July work programme.


We hope to solid tine and top dress the greens, apply our monthly applications of conditioner, wetting agent and plant growth regulator.The tees will be fertilised and the out of bounds trenches will be sprayed with a total herbicide to give them better definition.





                                                                                      Terry Wharton  Head Greenkeeper.

Welcome to our May update. 

The weather is certainly making it difficult to manage fine turf. The cool temperature is holding back growth and making it feel that we are at least three weeks behind in course presentation.


In the past month our work programme has allowed us to groom the greens, the grooming units raise the lateral growth and help to smooth out the surface.

The weather in May has been conducive to creating fungal disease ( Microdochium Patch) on the greens. We hope to grow the disease out at this time of the year and aid this action by spraying the greens with Soluble Iron (Fe) to dry and harden the leaf blade.

The picture below shows the 11th green after it had been sprayed and cut.

Our aeration programme is on track to reduce surface tension and allow airflow through the soil profile.  We followed this up with an application of Farmura (Conditioner) and Revolution (Wetting agent) The solid tining allows the applications to penetrate into the root zone.

 

In June we have our annual agronomy visit by Mr Alistair Beggs from the Sports Turf Research Institute he will advise us on course management and project work. 

 Our June blog will highlight the visit.

                                                               

                                                                             Terry Wharton   Head Greenkeeper

Welcome to  our April Blog.  

At the end of last month's blog we hoped for a balanced period of weather in April. We were looking for a increase in temperature and sufficient  rainfall to get the grass growing.

Well we went from warmth to frost with minimal rainfall,which surprisingly produced some growth.

Throughout April we had some beautiful sky lines, the picture below shows the view from the back fifth tee, with the early morning sun cutting through the mist and taking the frost off the turf

Toro's on the course.

The Toro machines are out on the course giving a great cut and presentation, the pictures below show the 3250 cutting the green and the 3100 on the surround.

                                                                                     








                             





The picture on the right shows the 3100 cutting the tees.








Aeration / Fertiliser application and Top Dressing

The greens team have been busy with aeration, feeding, and applying top dressing to the greens, targets for applications of top dressing and aeration are on track . And as usual the weather conditions will control the overall results.





      Repositioning the fountain in the 11th pond.                                                                                                                                                                                                                      
We recently called upon the diving skills of one of our members Mike Gildea, to re position the fountain.Mike is fully qualified to carry out the work and without his skill and knowledge it would of been difficult to site it in the appropriate part of the pond .

The fountain was kindly supplied by John Murphy.

 Mike was ably assisted  by  Fred Buckley, and  David Traynor from the greens team, they showed great skills in positioning the dingy in difficult conditions, well done.                      

.                                                                                                                                                                                                                          
 
                                       
























Work planned throughout May

In May we will  continue with aeration work ,top dressing greens, spraying selective herbicide and applying wetting agent (Revolution) and Farmura Porthcawl (Liquid organic fertiliser) to the greens.

Divoting tees and fairways will continue more frequently . The greens will be groomed to aid smoothness,with this work being conducive to better ball roll and pace.

  Lets hope for some good greenkeeping weather in May.    

                                                                        Terry Wharton       Head Greenkeeper                

March Update. 

Welcome to our latest blog, as usual the weather as controlled our work programme, Growth on the course has been minimal with the cool temperatures holding it back.

The greens have been verti drained again and top dressed twice, with little growth it has been difficult to work  the dressing into the sward.

To work the dressing into the upper profile we will procore with 8mm solid tines.This practice will not only aid aeration and drainage but will allow the dressing to fill the holes and take the dressing off the greens creating minimal surface disturbance.

When the temperature rises, we will apply a fertiliser to the greens to aid the plants development through the next few months





The dry period in early March allowed us to work on our fairways and practice area.

We sprayed them with Soluble Iron to check any small areas of moss and to aid definition and presentation. They were then scarified with the Wessex  and divoted.


Considering all the winter play, the fairways have stood up to the play quite well.The regular aeration work is really beneficial in moving water off the surface and developing strong healthy roots.







Over the past month we have cut out and shaped a new path from the 4th tee through to the 4th green. the path runs alongside the ponds and offers a great view of the wall garden.

 Over the past few years we have added additional paths at the 8th 11th 12th 13th 16th and 17th holes.

The paths enable us to create traffic routes from the tees and control the wear. The picture shows the new path from the 4th tee.



April work programme.


Another month flies by and we move into April. We hope for a balanced period of weather so we can continue top dressing and apply the greens fertiliser.

 The mowers are all ready for when the temperature rises to start the grass growing!!!!!


                      Terry Wharton   Head Greenkeeper

February Blog



Welcome to our February blog, it contains a summary of the work that has taken place throughout the month.

The weather enabled us to Vertidrain the greens and tees, with contractors Mallinsons coming in to vertidrain the fairways.

However the last ten days of the month as seen significant rainfall which stopped us from cutting and shaping  the course.
The greens received their monthly spray of soluble iron and are holding up well.

The rate of growth on the greens has been minimal throughout the month as you would expect at this time of the year. To achieve good ball roll on the greens in February we've rolled them with the Turf Iron achieving good results.

 To get the benefits of using the turf iron at this time of the year the rolling needs to be followed up with a regular programme of aeration to reduce any surface tension in the turf.

     
Tree Maintenance 

 February has seen the greens team working in the woodland copses, thinning out areas. This practice of tree management is recognised by the forestry commission.

 Our aim is to allow the trees to develop with good shape with adequate space between them.This will allow air and sunlight to penetrate through the trees on to the course enabling the ground to become firm and dry.

It is so important that we get the balance right in creating the correct growing environment in and around the various woodland areas on the course.
Heavily planted copses in a southerly position will greatly reduce the drainage qualities of the surrounding areas.This is due to the reduced air and sunlight penetration through the trees,leaving the areas around the copses constantly wet and difficult to maintain.

Trees planted close to land drains will reduce the draining qualities, the tree roots follow the drains in periods of dry weather in search for moisture,and over a period of time the drains will be blocked.

 We aim to manage the trees on the course in a appropriate way with guidance from the Sports Turf Research Institute and the estates tree surgeons.




Edging up bunkers 

We've started edging up the bunkers giving them great shape and reducing any overhangs on them.

The depth of sand is checked and over the next few weeks levels will be corrected going in to the start of the season.

The bunkers on the 13th hole are draining well, the bunker mat is reducing any wash down from the bunker face, this stops the sand from getting discoloured and losing its qualities.

We will follow up this work with regular tilling and raking  to keep the sand loose.


In March we will start to edge up the paths around the course and shale them.

Fertiliser will be applied to greens and tees (weather permitting) aeration will continue and the mowers may come out.

 The work programme is being cranked up ready for spring. Lets hope for some good weather.

                                                          Terry Wharton    Head Greenkeeper

January Update.

Welcome to our January blog.

We've been busy over the past month working on various projects, with the weather dictating our progress.

Throughout the month the team has been busy pruning and cutting lower growth and overhanging branches from the trees. Most of the lime trees in the Colonels Wood, have had their lower growth removed.This work gives the trees better shape with the overall area looking tidy and managed.

We took advantage of a dry period in the month, it enabled us to do some cutting,on greens tees, and the fairways, this gave great presentation to those areas.

The picture below shows the 4th tee that we seeded in September,it is coming on nicely.When the soil temperature rises in spring we'll apply a fertiliser to give the sward density and strength.

                 
            The picture above shows the 18th tee looking well presented for January.



Greens Aeration
Throughout January we've managed to aerate the greens weekly. It is so important to keep the surfaces open to relieve surface tension and allow water percolation through the root zone.

This practice alongside regular top dressing will reduce any thatch build up in the upper profile of the surface.          



                               The picture below shows the sisis slitter in action

The 3rd green which we drained last October is performing well. We need to check the surface around the drain lines over the next few months to ensure we go into spring with true levels.



Ornithology Programme.

We have cleaned out the bird boxes that are positioned around the course, ready for spring. All the boxes we cleaned last year had been used, this was really pleasing.The landscape around the course is a haven for wildlife and with the boxes in position it gives the birds additional nesting options.

           
                              Jack Hosker and Chris Lewis checking one of the boxes.

We hope for a period of dry weather in February to enable us to complete our winter work.

Vertidraining will be taking place on the greens tees, and fairways. We'll start to put some additional cutting in place to give the course some better definition.       (Weather permitting!!!!!)

                                                                         Terry Wharton  Head Greenkeeper.