A very productive week with fewer players than the previous weeks making it a lot easier to get the work done.  One of the skills you need to work on a course as busy as Cool Tweed is the ability to keep working in amongst the play and it is something that is talked about with all prospective employees.

The week didn't start well though as I heard the irrigation pumps cycling when there was no sprinklers running which generally means a leak which I quickly found as I walked to the pump shed and saw the water bubbling out of the 17R tee rockwall.  Visions of uprooting the entire rockwall appeared and the need for some sort of excavator was going to be required which on a moments notice is not always that easy to arrange together with the knowledge that it was a 150mm mainline.  But the excavator that did the West greens was going to be working on Queensland time on Monday and could come in first thing to do the digging.  So at 4.30 am we started the dig and fortunately found the leak outside the wall and got the job done.  It did mean that there was no water available if required for 8 very new greens and 9 tender Bentgrass greens in 30+ degree temperatures so it was a fairly nerve wracking day hoping for the best.  Purging the air that gets in to the lines is extremely important and this was done late in the day followed by a full irrigation cycle so after arriving to the course at 4.15am I got back in my car at 7.25pm to go home.

Doing the repair

And I guess last Friday was sort of part of this week when some moron decided that the courses would be a good 4 wheel drive venue and in particular the bunkers.  Fortunately there was little damage to the turf and / or the bunkers as they wheeled through 15 bunkers and across 6 greens including 15W which was only opened the day after.

Out of LHS bunker 14R and across the green

Thru RHS bunker 16R and across the green

Across 15W green

The back 9 West greens continue to develop with 5 of the 8 currently in play.  The greens are still very young and will continue to develop.  10W was close to being opened this week but it is still only 9 weeks since it was planted so another week will do it wonders.  All the greens should be back in play by February 4 which is well in advance of when anticipated.

The greens are being constantly monitored for soil moisture during the day to ensure that there is no heat stress / drying out of which there has been none evident at this stage.  The 5 greens that are open lose about 25% of soil moisture content during the day which would just about be curtains for them if they were Bentgrass.