A big week on the courses with the WPGA Tour Q School 36 hole event on Monday and Tuesday and the turf being laid on the re-configured 4R fairway on Monday.  The tour school didn't hit off until 8am from one tee only which gave us ample time for course preps and despite the low number in the field we did as good a prep as possible.  It's amazing the difference five staff members with ample time properly preparing bunkers can make.  We generally have two maximum raking and they nearly have to run to get the bunkers raked in front of play so it was a bit of a luxury with all that time.  The course looked a treat and the greens rolled perfectly for the players who were from all reports very complimentary.

And just on the West greens please don't forget to repair your pitchmarks.  Incoming balls don't break the surface like the old bentgrass days but the greens still receive damage which not only injures the grass leaf but also affects the putting surface.

 

Two untouched pitchmarks 13W green.

A favourable forecast of rain allowed us to get five tonne of fertiliser out on to the West course on Thursday.  Unfortunately a tractor breakdown cost some time otherwise more would have gone out.  The River course tees were done on Friday morning so a few more showers would be nice.  It's normal to get leaf burn after the fertiliser goes out and this effect will grow out soon.  We didn't do the ''blue couch fairways'' as we call them as they are growing pretty well on their own with those fairways being 1, 13, 14, 16 and 18 on the West course. 

Buggy tracks evident after the fert on 12W.

It's interesting this season we have been really going hard after some weeds via spot spraying in these fairways which is the safest way due to the low herbicide tolerance of both the blue couch and kikuyu.  But we have had an unexpected recovery of ''green couch'' in the treated areas which is the predominant and preferred grass type elsewhere on the courses.  The boxed area below is the regenerating green couch after a successful spraying which has never happened before. 

Note the colour difference in the turf?