Friday, March 15, 2024

The installation of the irrigation system continues with 9W being completed on Thursday and open for play on Friday.  We are still waiting on the communication cable to be hooked up which is planned for next week and then we will officially be operating the old and the new system side by side.  9W has been operated manually and has worked a treat although until all the new mainlines are installed flow rates are down a little but not enough to affect performance.

As I mentioned previously there will be times where other holes are affected by the works necessitating other holes to be shortened as was the case Thursday and Friday when the new mainline had to be extended across to the next hole being 8W.  8W should be completed by Wednesday and then we move on to 7W.

While the holes are closed we will take the opportunity of no play to give the bunkers on each hole a heavy renovation including levelling the sand and adding sand where needed.  Speaking of the bunkers, all the West course greenside bunkers were ''back-faced"" this week which means the sand was dragged off the faces and exit points and levelled on the floor or playing area of the bunker.  And the River course bunkers had 30 tonne of sand added to the main play areas.

9W bunker renovated while out of play.

LHS 1R bunker topped up with sand.

The photo below shows just how much sand can be moved in a single bunker shot.  Multiply that by the number of players we have and the multiple attempts a lot of those players make to extricate themselves from the bunker and you can imagine just how much sand gets moved around in and out of the bunker.

Is that a shovel?



 

Friday, March 8, 2024

Week one of the irrigation project has now been completed and a highly successful week it was.  The first thing we had to do was isolate all existing irrigation on 9W fairway which was a task in itself as there were 4 x 100 mm pipes feeding the fairway.  We also had to ensure that we had water supply still available to the holes in the corner – 5,6,7 and 8W.  Once this was successfully completed the main line that will feed 9W fairway was trenched in down the left hand side and a 125 millimetre pipe was laid in this trench along with a new 50 millimetre potable water supply pipe and communication cable that will run to each sprinkler.  The potable line will supply all on course drinking fountains and toilet block.  From the mainline trench the lateral trenches that run out to the sprinklers in the middle of the fairway were ploughed in and then risers for the sprinklers were installed on the pipe.  At this stage the fairway sprinklers will be installed on Monday and the green will also be installed on Monday and Tuesday hopefully having us off the 9W fairway by Wednesday which will be two days ahead of schedule.

Unfortunately due to the number of open trenches and holes the hole will remain out of play over this weekend due to safety concerns.

I will upload a video to the Blog on Saturday morning with a bit more information from the first week.

Friday, March 1, 2024

The excitement is certainly building with the Irrigation Project starting next Monday although there is also a sense of apprehension for what the diggers are going to hit and break under the ground.  Breaking existing irrigation pipes that will be defunct isn't really that much of a problem but we need to keep the old system operating all the way through the project so hitting and breaking anything that is still required is the concern.  There are very few plans and those that are available are not that accurate and there is a myriad of various services under the ground.  It is going to be quite a project and the completion date can't come soon enough.  In February alone we completed eighteen irrigation repairs for the month. 

The list below shows just where the project will start and a bit of a timeline on anticipated progress.  This is all subject to weather interruptions although with our ground conditions being relatively dry we shouldn't really lose too much time to the weather.  It is intended to work on just one hole at a time to minimise impact on play.  That said, there will be times where a trench may be required to cross an adjacent fairway to the hole being worked on.  We will be endeavouring to have as much signage as possible to assist players and ask that when you are moving to the next hole after where the work is being carried out that you stay as far away from our staff and the contractors as possible. 

Hole W9                     10 days          Mon 4/03/24 - Fri 15/03/24

Hole W5                     7 days            Mon 18/03/24 - Tue 26/03/24

Hole W6                     4 days            Wed 27/03/24 - Mon 1/04/24

Hole W7                     7 days            Tue 2/04/24 - Wed 10/04/24

Hole W8                     4 days            Thu 11/04/24 -Tue 16/04/24

Hole W4                     10 days          Wed 17/04/24 - Tue 30/04/24

Hole W10                  10 days          Wed 1/05/24 - Tue 14/05/24

 

Last Saturday's forecast wasn't good and the red sky in the morning was an ominous potential warning but nothing much eventuated from the spectacular sunrise and we have had one of the driest weeks of the summer which has now officially ended.

Views like this make the early mornings easy to take.

 

Friday, February 23, 2024

Another weather forecast for the weekend that varies depending on who you listen to although when it is as humid as it's been then there's no doubt we should get some storms and the severity obviously varies over the coast.  Over the past month or so we have been fairly lucky that we have missed some of the worst of the intense rainfall that some others have received.  The chart below tells the rainfall story for the first two months of 2024 and although the figures aren't that extraordinary for us, when the rain is falling is having an effect on the club's trading figures.  Almost every weekend has been affected by rain which means lower player numbers on the main trading days.  Poor old F & B manager Anthony is pulling his hair out while I don't mind the turf getting a bit of a break with the lower player numbers.

Interesting figures.

If you go back and look at the rainfall figures since 1.11.2023 we have had 995mm which is 40 inches in the old scale!!

9R green is progressing well and it received another heavy sanding today to help re-level the surface after some torrential rain damaged it recently.  The chipping green is also growing in well and even though it was planted a week after 9R it has virtually caught up.  9R green was built out of a straight sand with a range of amendments added to try to create an aged soil profile for the turf to establish.  The chipping green profile is the material that was removed from 9R and was a forty year old green profile full of micro organisms and a range of nutrients available to the plant.  An irrigation failure on Wednesday afternoon meant that the sprinklers on the chipping green didn't turn off so there has been some washout that will need to be attended to. 

More sand laddie.

 

 

Friday, February 16, 2024

It's hard to believe another week has flown by and it finished with soddenly wet conditions today.  The water table is still very high and almost any rain will cause pooling but another 70mm wasn't what we were looking for.  Some really heavy rain last Sunday morning just as the comp started caused some fairly severe damage to 9R green but fortunately there was only minor washing of the surface.  There was however quite severe ''pock marking'' almost as if it had hailed golf ball size hailstones.  We had to heavily sand the surface this week and for a green that is just over a week old it is progressing very well.  Final leveling will take some more time due to the water damage.  Todays torrential downpour at around 8.30am once again fortunately only caused some minor damage to the new chipping green which was planted on Tuesday.  We decided to construct the green with no drainage underneath and allow for surface runoff and that is why there is water pooling on the surface as the new stolons need to be kept wet at all time for the first two weeks.  It will be fine when fully grassed and in play with any rainwater sheeting across the surface.  The photo below shows the excellent root development on 9R just seven days post planting.

Just 7 days old.

And whilst it has been great growing in conditions for the new greens it has also been excellent conditions for the encroaching foreign Couchgrass on the West greens.  The photo below shows a rhizome from the outside of the green sprouting 12 inches inside the green.  It is impossible to pull these out so a herbicide spotting program will swing into action next week. 

Pesky intruders.


 

Despite the rain we still need a live irrigation system and so when there was a blowout on 14W this morning it had to be fixed.  Thanks to Gus and the intrepid crew members who braved the worst of the rain to complete the repair.  We needed to shut the system down  so that is why there were some sprinklers and hoses being used today to blow the air out of the pipelines.


It never ends.



 

Friday, February 9, 2024

Another hectic week on the courses with the planting of 9R green on Tuesday then the construction of the new practice green on the short range.  The photo below shows one of 9R stolons on Thursday afternoon about fifty hours after planting with some new white roots evident which is a great start.  You almost couldnt have better conditions to grow a green in with the current heat, humidity and moisture.  It may look a bit strange that the sprinklers are still operating when it's raining but it is absolutely critical that while the new plants have virtually no root system that the stolons are kept wet at all times to ensure théy have the best chance of surviving.

9R planting day.

 
New roots = great start.

The new practice green has been completed and is ready to be planted next Tuesday.  The idea behind its design was to replicate as many shots as possible that players find during a round within 25m of the green.  As mentioned last week there will be some contamination by foreign couchgrass as the material came from the old 9R green but we will endeavour to keep out as much as possible.

The target greens on the long range have also been completed this week and the grass will naturally grow through them over time and flags will be installed.  Due to the varying distances available when playing to the new ''greens'' the distance signs will be removed once they are in play.  There is no intent for them to be managed at greens height as they are simply practice aids.

And a little excitement (well for me anyway) with the first physical on course action taking place for the new irrigation system after the foundation material for the new pump shed that is to be constructed arrived onsite this week.  A brand new shed and pump set will be installed and the old shed will also remain after it is de-commissioned and used for storage.

And we're off.......