Sunday, January 29, 2012

Hopefully we won't be breaking the rainfall figure for January but we are very close   The 450mm of rain we received from Monday evening to Saturday morning pushed our January total to 580mm which puts January 2012 down as the second wettest on record behind 1951 when 610mm fell and just in front of 2006 when there was 557mm.  The average for January is 188mm and there have been few occasions when more than 400mm has fallen for the month.                                 
I don't remember seeing so much water lying in such volumes around the courses after the main rainfall event has finished.  But I guess we can count ourselves lucky that the river didn't break its banks by too much when you compare us to courses further up the coast such as The Glades and Colonial as the photos below show.  So we can't really complain too much about the water still lying on the courses such as 4 River below.   And spare a thought for Royal Pines and their new Superintendent Lincoln Coombes and staff who are trying to prepare the course for the Ladies Masters which is supposed to start this week.  
Colonial GC

 
The Glades


4 River fairway pools of water
And trying to pull out a positive from the past week is difficult but the lack of play has the West course greens looking absolutely superb at the moment with almost all pitch marks recovered and the turf very healthy.  If only we could keep them free of pitch marks!

I was very fortunate to have gotten the growth regulator applied to the fairways prior to the rain starting so their growth hasn't been too excessive.  At this stage I doubt if I will try and mow fairways until Thursday which will be two weeks since they have been mown and with no more rain this week they should be back to their best by weeks end.  Growth regulator is also applied to the bunker edges to reduce trimming and to keep the heavy mowers away from the edges.  Unfortunately not all the bunkers got done but the difference on those that have been done is significant.  The area to the right of the golf ball in the photo below has had growth regulator applied and the area to the left hasn't. 
Bunker edge low growth

2 comments:

  1. Gday peter since you have moved up to sunny tweed whats the weather been like dry ????
    Hope your course is recovering the photos look very intersting , i no at victoria you always needed more water but maybe not this much good luck .

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  2. G'day John, Good to hear from you and I trust all is well. I have never seen rain like it but the course takes the rain really well and we are back in play in no time. A lot drier than some other courses up the coast that's for sure.

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