Not really much to report on the courses with a pretty much routine maintenance week.  The West course closure on Tuesday after the ladies did afford us the chance to get the West greens solid tine aerated which allowed for some much needed gas exchange after such a prolonged dry period by allowing some fresh air to enter the soil profile.  This type of aeration has little effect on the putting surface and I would like to do it more often which should be able to happen now with the extra time.

We are still very dry with just 4mm falling on Monday night when parts of Murwillumbah got 30+mm and Headland GC on the Sunshine Coast in excess of 100mm.  A lot of that would have run off and not penetrated the surface but they put in a big dam a few years ago and that was filled to capacity.  So at least someone is smiling!

I noticed this week that some of the Gum trees are starting to lose their bark so a messy time is on the way.  I have never looked into timing of this phenomenon and the reason for it other than its a pain to clean up and generally happens around greens renovation time in November. 

And in some ways its hard to believe that this week marks three years since the back 9 West greens conversion to TifEagle stared on 13W green.  In some ways it seems a lifetime ago and in others just like yesterday.

Bobcat about to start stripping 13W off.

The layered soil profile we found on 13W.

And I just noticed recently the return of the Honey bee eater birds.  They burrow into some of the bunker faces and elsewhere and are here for around three to four months.  A few years ago we had a keen photographer on the courses and he snapped these amazing shots of  them in full flight.

Beautiful.

Dinner time.