This week has been up and down weather wise the forecast not good at the start of the week but picked up and has turned out better than expected.
The only bad weather was on tues where we had thunderstorms which passed very close to the course. We had a couple of heavy down pours that effected the 12th green only but was easily solved. It once again shows this green is needing some attention.
The two main weather systems that were forecast this week scraped by us, the first as mentioned was thundery moving up the coast, we only got 7 mm of rain where as some areas only a few miles away received triple this amount, the second system on Thursday came in from the east stalling around 10 miles from us before moving south. So a potentially wet day turned into a really good dry one.
The front across to the east.
On the course we have mainly been cutting ready for a busy weekend of golf. The course looks superb once more, the team have been working hard to bring the consistent playing surfaces all golfers want.
A couple of other tasks we have carried out are firstly the greens have been sprayed with a moss killer. Products that kill moss by a true chemical breakdown of the structure are hard to find nowadays. Greenkeepers and even gardeners have to rely on ferrous sulphate (iron) all to often. Most of the time that is fine, however most of the time this only scorches the plant, stopping growth and giving the grass around it a chance to outcompete.
Moss is usually a sign of other issues, compaction, thatch, poor drainage, lack of nutrition or simply low cutting heights.
We have two main types of moss, silver thread moss and cushion moss. The product we sprayed the greens with has had a good effect on the silver thread moss, we may have to use a different product to combat small areas of cushion moss.
We have also been touching up weeds on paths and steps.
Here's a picture of the 2nd green and surround, this was infested with ryegrass a year ago, the rescue application has worked really well, but who can spot a sliver of rye grass I missed.
The greens received an application of fertiliser wetter and iron which was watered in to get the product in to the soil.
Next week we will topdress the greens, work on sprinkler heads and tidy ditches
