WOW, this rain is now getting ridiculous.  I seem to have penned that several times over the last couple of years but seriously enough is enough.  Yesterday had three of the most severe downfalls I have witnessed here and we finished with 132mm in the 24 hours to 9am Friday (that 132 actually fell between 9am and 7pm Thursday) after 24mm the previous 24 hours.  Fortunately there wasn't as much rain upstream in the Tweed River so a massive amount of water has been able to exit the property overnight into Friday and during the day today.

Thursday saw the first squall hit at around 10am and that dumped 14mm in even time.  Then another 60mm in the 12.30pm dump followed by another 60mm in the late afternoon event.

The photo below is the 10am dump and its effect on 10W green with the water sheeting off the green as it is supposed to and that was just the 14mm.  Hate to think what it looked like later in the day.  The 10am radar is below with the little squally system that dropped the 14mm right on top of us.

Water draining off 10W green.

  

Right on top of us.

I am always on the lookout for signs of approaching bad weather and the seagulls seem to be a pretty reliable source of information as they were all over 4 / 9W dam early yesterday.

They are pretty reliable?

 

I mentioned a little while back about a long range forecaster from the Sunshine Coast.  He predicted a "rainfall event" for August 21 about two months ago.  The scary one is that he has predicted "wettest period that could cause great flash floods is 27th August to 1st September".  It will be very interesting if that rings true as at this stage there is no one predicting any rainfall of any significance next week.  You have to subscribe to receive more detailed location based forecasts and if next week comes off I may well be subscribing.  The forecast area he covers seems to cover the east coast from Sydney to the Sunshine Coast.  Let's hope he's wrong??

We finally had some luck with the weather this week as we worked toward today's Pro am.  There were enough showers and rain to keep the courses soft but some of the heavy storms thankfully eluded us for a change. The crew did a great job preparing the West course, particularly the bunkers.  The West course bunkers aren't good in the wet and were out of play all week as we dealt with the rain.  But come Friday they were in great shape and were a credit to the bunker crew this week.  The course was closed on Thursday afternoon for Pro am preps and the photo shows a greenside bunker on 1W late Thursday.  Some players just have no appreciation of what it takes to get a course up.

Went looking for a left hander with big feet but lucky for them I couldn't find them.

 

The battle with some herbicide resistant Poa annua (winter grass) has continued this year although populations aren't as large as the past two years, particularly in the greens even though the constantly wet conditions are perfect for Poa to thrive.  We have trialed a different product on the greens with no success again.  Some of our fairway trials have been successful but the product used can't be used on greens.  Hopefully we get some normal hot and dry weather in spring to help our efforts.

A very quiet week on the courses from our work output point of view with full comps and double shotgun starts for the Vets week of golf kind of making it hard to be overly productive.  Five staff were on leave of some sort or at trade school for the week which is ideal timing given the volume of play.  The weather probably didn't behave itself as it usually does for the week but I trust the players enjoyed themselves.

On the irrigation front the actual install of sprinklers was completed last week and this week saw some of the rectifications take place.  These should be completed by the end of next week and then the pump station needs some finishing touches, including the new power supply being bought on line.  For us it will be a process of working through lifting low sprinklers and topping up trenchlines over the coming months.  The contractors will be off site after next week ending what seems to have been a marathon 18 month install which was severely hampered by the rain.  A very big thank you to all members and players for putting up with the disruption during the install.  I can assure you that when we dry out - and we will - it will be worth it. 

I doubt that the photo below is real but it gave me a laugh that a golf club in Sweden installed a trackman on one of their tees for a members competition after seeing a similar thing on the coverage of a pro tournament.  And this was the result!!

Totally relatable!!

 

I was going to try and not mention the weather after a fairly uneventful week but the forecast doesn't look good for the weekend, and it depends on who you listen to as to the expected ferocity.  It certainly sounds like we are going to get some serious wind as well as some rain.  I think the movement of the system is a little unpredictable at this stage so it's a wait and see.  

One thing we won't be using this weekend is the new irrigation system!!  The installation of 1W green and the nursery green area occurred this week so now all sprinklers are in the ground and it's time for a clean up and some rectifications and final adjustments to happen.  We will also be doing some work later in the month on repairing some of the damaged areas like at rear 4W green, RHS 16W green and front of 14W green as well as the soil stockpile areas.  There will also be a lot of repair work carried out when it's a bit warmer and the turf can establish a lot faster than at this time of year.  That will involve a lot of the buggy path entries and exits.  As part of the installation a specific sprinkler has been located to cover these areas in the hope of improving them  However given the massive amount of cart traffic we get I don't hold out much hope of holding a turf cover.   

The Vets week of golf is upon us again next week so here's hoping that the run with perfect weather they have had over the many years will continue.  Fingers crossed on that one that's for sure!!