The end of last week brought us some much needed rain, well only a few millimetres but it has boosted the colour and growth on the course. The temperatures are still cold but there is enough warmth and strength in the sunshine to encourage growth. Last week we made good progress with the badger damage repairs on hole 6, one more day and we should have completed this area. The seeded areas we initially seeded are germinating well, these have been fertilised with the same slow release fertiliser we put on the fairways in early March. This only leaves the 22nd hole to tidy and seed. On Friday we had a hail shower which put a stop to play for around 15 minutes, not unheard of at this time of the year but strange to see never the less.
We cut the fairways again on Friday trying to 'burn' in the stripes for summer, after a couple of cuts they are really starting to stand out. After a month of cutting in one direction the second angle of stripes will be then cut into the fairways, creating the diamond/chequered effect.
Over the weekend the course is steadily greening up, so this week we are concentrating our efforts on cutting some grass to ensure the course is presented nicely even though there is little growth. The semi rough is patchy as the winter wear is still evident, where golfer foot traffic is less the semi has grown a few inches. All the semi rough will be cut this week to reduce the patchy growth, this is the first time ALL the semi rough has been cut, over the 15 years I have been at the club this is latest we have had to cut the semi rough, putting in to context the serverity of the winter we have just experienced.
We have also been cutting the driving range, tees, surrounds, copses, pathway edges, fairways and cutting and grooming all the greens. The greens at this time of the year get some lateral growth from bent grasses, this can lead to bobbly greens later in the day as the lateral growth gets spiked up by foot traffic. To control this we groom the greens with the groomers on the John Deere mowers. The groomers are set flush to the surface of the green, this ensures that lateral growth is lifted, cut and removed. The greens are then cut to take off any uneven grass and leave a smooth finish. They are being cut at 3.5mm actual height of cut, as the fertiliser we applied last week has started to take affect and growth is much dense than a couple of weeks ago.
Other jobs have been to turf the bunker tops on the 6th hole, collect range balls and water the turf on 25th tee and 21st green.
