The wind has certainly been the major player for course maintenance and playing the game this week.  Not only its strength but also the wind chill factor made it an uncomfortable week.  Only the one major tree came down which was late on Friday at the back of the first green.  The debris on the fairways detracts from the courses aesthetics and the number of leaves and branch debris in the roughs makes it most difficult to find golf balls.  The rotary outfront mowers were out in force on the roughs and fairways trying to clean up as much as possible.  They are fitted with "mulching blades" that smash up the leaves and debris leaving a much cleaner surface but the constant wind doesn't help.

Tree down

 Speaking of the wind, a website I have mentioned before - Willy Weather - has a few new features including a "wind rose" which plots the wind directions for the current month and the average over the past five years.  I knew we had a lot of southerlies but was surprised that wind from the south or SSW / SSE accounts for 37% of our wind compared with 20% from the north and NNE / NNW so nearly twice the number of southerlies.  Here's a link to the wind information;
http://wind.willyweather.com.au/nsw/far-north-coast/tweed-heads.html

The West greens have recovered very well from the renovation though repair of pitch marks is pretty disappointing with the greens badly scarred which further prolongs their recovery.  The mowing height is nearly back to normal but the lush growth still needs to slow down for the fine surface to return.  The ducks have been feasting on them leaving their droppings to interfere with play so I thought I would try the fake decoy Hawk but it unfortunately didn't work.  It certainly got the Magpies upset as can be seen in the video below from 12W green and is doing a fine job down on 5W green keeping the Cockatoos off the green.    

And Jason Day has set the golf world on fire of late but I got the screenshot below watching the golf this week and it shows just how dominant Tiger was at the peak of his game.  Astounding really. 

An extraordinary record

  

A very frustrating week trying to get the West greens mown down following their renovation last week.  The seemingly continual light showers were enough to affect the mowing as the turf needs to be bone dry to allow for a good cut and to prevent sand sticking to the rollers on the mowers for the first few mowings.  The sand finishes up caking on the rollers which then affects the height and quality of cut not to mention what it does to the bearings on the mowing heads.  The plan was to get out on Friday afternoon after the Members competition and give them a nice dry cut until the weather intervened and 25 mm of rain tumbled down in an hour from 11.30. The radar shot below has the yellow dot right over the top of the course at midday when it was nigh on torrential!!  Fortunately the wind dried the surfaces and I was able to get a full mow in dry conditions late in the afternoon.

The yellow marks the spot!!

We have had a few vehicles driving on the courses recently with one about 3 weeks ago driving through the bunker at the rear of 1R green and across the green.  The photo below shows the most recent visitors tyre marks on 13R green just pulling up short of the greenside bunker.  If only they had kept going as I doubt they would have got through given the steepness of the bunker.  Fortunately the actual turf surface has not been broken as of yet which is another benefit of couchgrass over bentgrass!!

13R green tyre marks.

The West greens renovation was completed earlier this week and two fine and sunny days certainly helped until the severe electrical storm that rolled in at 2.30pm on Tuesday afternoon which was just two hours early and has meant not all the sand has been rubbed in properly.  It also delayed the opportunity to fertilise the greens so the recovery will be a bit slower than normal.

The radar on Tuesday at 2.30pm showing the approaching storm.

The approaching storm

Even though the greens are renovated it is still just as important to repair pitch marks on them to assist in the surface returning to normal. 

In conjunction with the greens works the tees were also aerated and we were able to get over the fairways as well which was a huge effort by the staff and the task is made so much easier by having two full days to complete the works.  I realise it is not the most popular activity we carry out but is one of the most necessary for the health of the turf.

Next week the front of the West greens will be aerated and the holes left open to try and assist firming up these areas.  The greens need a bit more water and unfortunately the irrigation system isn't the most uniform so a lot of water finishes up where you don't really want it to go and the fronts of the greens are the worst for this.

The playing corridor from 3, 10 and 13 West tees were also widened while there was no play on the course.  All three had  grown in severely making the options for tee shots more difficult.  15 and 16 on the River course will be done next week weather permitting.  There were also several other large low hanging limbs removed whilst the contractors were on site.

The Toll Charity golf day has come and gone in a flash with a lot less paraphernalia on the golf courses compared to last year.  There were still four big prime movers dotted around the courses and unfortunately we got some damage when one of them was being removed.  Fortunately it's over the rear of 5R green where I don't think I have ever seen anyone play from!  It is quite a soft area of the course but quite a "safe" location for the truck.

Given the chart below I doubt there would be many "soft" courses on the West Coast of the USA given the intensity of drought highlighted.  Golf courses are doing it very tough over there and brings back memories of some very tough times in Australia not too many years ago.
 

The West greens renovation will take place commencing Monday and will consist of a hollow tyne with 5/8 inch diameter tynes followed by some amendments / fertiliser then a heavy sanding.  Root structure on the greens is still good and the renovation will only improve that situation.

We will also start aerating the fairways next week.  They haven't been done for a couple of years and are in desperate need.  It is not the "prettiest" result on the surface so the local rule for relief from "aeration holes" will need to be used. 

And a bit of trivia with my motorbike about to clock up 25,000 kilometres after just four years.  I'm sure glad its got a comfortable seat!!

A very tough week just gone with a flu outbreak amongst the course staff affecting numbers with only 5 on course staff available for Tuesday and Wednesday.  Despite this the efforts of the crew were outstanding in getting the courses up for the week ends play and in particular Round 3 of the Club Championships.  Fridays weather was just about perfect with a light breeze that allowed us to get the courses cleaned up  and clear from the tree and leaf debris.  I don't think anyone was at the Gold Coast show as both courses were packed to the rafters.

On Tuesday this week we installed a new method of irrigation control that has the potential to revolutionise irrigation in any situation but in particular golf courses, particularly those with a "hydraulic" system such as ours.  A hydraulic system means that water pressure is used to keep the sprinkler valves closed and therefore any loss of pressure means the sprinkler will pop up.  So any sort of leak or major pressure variation can cause havoc with sprinklers coming on unintentionally.  If there is a leak in the control lines you can try tracing it which on a sandy site proves difficult sometimes or you just have to replace the tube which means trenching from the sprinkler itself right back to the controller which can unearth all sorts of hidden obstacles.  This new system uses underground wireless communication from the controller to the sprinkler location within a 350 metre radius without any trenching which is simply amazing. 

Disc adjacent to field controllers

The transmitter is fitted close to the controller (under a 300mm aluminium disc) and the receiver is in the body of the sprinkler and we have currently installed 3 sprinklers.  There are 14 sprinkler locations on the greens where sprinklers have been removed or paired with another sprinkler to avoid the trenching so this control will allow us to attain much improved irrigation coverage.  It will also allow for extensions to the irrigated area as now we only need to get the irrigation pipe and a sprinkler to the area and no tubed control.  And absolutely best of all it's an Australian invention!!

The River greens were fertilised last week to try and get some colour in them and they have taken that up combined with the warm temperatures and are growing like I have never seen them before in August.  A plant growth regulator was applied this morning to try and curb the growth spurt.  The good news is that 13 R green has also responded and only has the very rear edge still weak.  The presence of some sandflies this week indicates that spring has already well and truly sprung!

And with the amount of social play on the West course today there were some temper tantrums demonstrated that could well have resulted in this;

About the only thing I haven't seen on a golf course....yet!!

I wrote this piece last week and forgot to properly load it to the Blog so it will be this weeks post with all the information still pertinent.  Hopefully the rain up on the Sunshine Coast doesn't make it this far down and spoil the party that is round 2 of the Club Champs.

The beautiful weather continues but it's not enough to get the grass moving again although it provides great golfing conditions.

I drove past 12R green on Tuesday at 9am and noticed the full sunlight the green was receiving and then drove back up to 13R to compare.  The photo below demonstrates the intense shade that 13R is subjected to.  No Couchgrass can grow successfully in shade such as this so we will just manage it as best we can.  The very back edge of 12R is still affected by shade later in the day and is the reason it is so thin at the rear.

12R green @ 9am.

13R green same day same time same sun angle.

New Maroochy River course.

I got the opportunity to play the new Maroochy River GC (formerly Horton Park) on Friday and came away very impressed.  The new course opened on May 30th and has been getting a lot of play but has taken it very well.  The greens were grassed with Tifeagle and were putting very nicely.  Considering it was built on a an old cane farm the undulation created is just enough to present a challenge without being too over the top.

An absolutely superb week of weather which is to be expected for the Vets week of golf on with history showing one wet day in 14 years and the majority have been weeks such as this.  The courses have been packed to the rafters with players and congratulations to the Vets organisers and volunteers who do so much to keep the fields moving.  Also congratulations to the players on their care of the course.  It's such a stark contrast when compared to the Twin Towns Open for example last Sunday when the greens were left peppered with unrepaired pitch marks and litter left all over the courses.  I have toured the courses each evening after the Vets have finished and found 2 unrepaired pitch marks over all the greens and nothing left out of place.  Even the sand buckets at 11 West tee carpark were neatly stacked!

It's amazing how quickly the courses have dried out now with quite substantial irrigation required on the greens in particular.  All the recently turfed areas needed some water today and while it's nice to see the warmth it could make for a long irrigation season.

As mentioned last week soil samples have been taken from selected West greens to establish what amendments will be added at renovation.  13R green was also sampled to check on its progress.  One of the goals of the autumn / winter maintenance program on the West greens has been the development of a strong root system and this will be further addressed at the renovation.  The photo below shows some strong growth from a plug on 13W green which was one of the hardest hit greens last summer.  This depth of about 6 inches is pretty representative across all the West greens which is very encouraging.  It's a long way from my excitement when I had a paltry single one inch of root recovery in January in the other photo below!!  As mentioned last summer when the soil temperatures reach extreme levels as they do here then the roots just can't keep going.

Good root growth on 13W

Not so good roots in January!