Green keepers News

MID YORKSHIRE GOLF CLUB

Sept 2013

September Review

In the early part of September, we continued with light top dressing on greens to get levels back after course maintenance.  We continued to roll greens to keep speed and trueness on the greens.  We applied a granular feed to the greens to promote some growth.  September saw the commencement of the preparation of winter greens, they were cut to 7mm and heavily top dressed and fed with a liquid fertiliser.  Tees were overseeded in the early part of September to get a fresh variety of seed that will be more wear tolerant.  Tees have been regularly divoted and so were landing areas.  We commenced verti-draining fairways in late September, firstly tackling some of the ‘wettest’ fairways, before the weather turns against us.  We have continued with the de-stoning and sand movement in our bunkers and cutting back longer rough areas,

October

Greens:

We will be lifting the height of cut at some point this month, dependent on the weather, probably when the first frost arrives.  We hope to get a light dressing of sand on this month too and will also apply a granular feed at the back end of this month to promote plant health and to harden the leaf in preparation for the rigours of winter.  We will also apply a worm suppressant on greens, to deter worm casting and we will also apply a fungicide to combat any disease.  Greens will also be aerated in October.

Tees:

The height of cut will be raised this month.  We will only cut once per week, continue divoting and will solid tine tees, top dress and apply a granular feed.

Surrounds:

This month will see some areas ‘roped off’ as part of our traffic management programme.  We will continue aeration to our surrounds and will commence re-turfing some of our bare areas in and around the greens.  Height of cut will be raised and we will cut once per week.

Fairways:

We will continue to verti-drain fairways 3,4,5,6 and 11 first, members will be aware these fairways have a tendency to be our most problematic. So, we intend to work on these first before the weather turns against us. We will carry on divoting fairways.  Height of cut will be raised and we will cut once per week.  Bare areas on fairways will be re-turfed.

Other:

Further areas of rough will be cut back, bunkers will be de-stoned and sand movement will be corrected.  We will be re-turfing areas around the course where there are bare of damaged areas.  We will widen the pathway at the first tee.  We will build a new bridge at the second ditch and re-turf where the two old sleeper bridges are.  Some path ends will be either re-turfed or have astro turf laid to repair damaged areas.  Some drainage lines will be lifted and levelled.  Some of this work will be commenced during October and may continue all through the winter season.

October’s weather forecast looks good so far, but in the not too distant future, we will be going on to hedgehog/winter wheels.  The reason we do this, is to protect the course.  We introduced winter wheels last year and it was very successful as we felt it benefited the course during the past season.

Chris Webb

Course Manager