Greens Renovations - Why renovate greens?

Well, the greens renovations have now been completed. Judging from the scores from today's comp, they are running pretty well with plenty of good scores.

What was done. 

• Greens were scarified with scarifying units fitted to a greens mower. 
• Cored with approximately 15 mm tynes with cores removed from the green - slight hiccup with the main corer breaking down - a borrowed corer and a few extra hours by the boys and they were back on track
• Cores picked up using the sweeping machine - light roll to smooth out the surface
• Amendments added - fertilisers
• Sanding of the greens using the John Deere Gator with the top dresser on the back
• Sand allowed to dry out and then dragged in using a steel drag mat to behind the quad bike
• The greens will then be brushed in again over the next few days with a mat of artificial grass
• They will probably get there first mow after a week or so with the mowers height raised

Why renovate the greens??

Two main reasons are to reduce compaction and thatch build-up. It also enables us to get some amendments into the soil and to the root zone.

Compaction

The greens become compacted from foot traffic and machinery throughout the year and do not allow water and nutrients to effectively get to the root zone. You will notice that the greens would flood very quickly after a small amount of rain. This is due to the compaction of the greens over time. The surface of the greens will dry out more easily if the water cannot get down to the root zone. Coring the greens allows nutrients, oxygen and water to get down to the root zone while adding top dressing to assist with this process.

Thatch is a build-up of organic matter between the surface of the green and the soil. If this is allowed to build up the greens will become spongy, more susceptible to disease and reduce the water infiltration rate. Scarifying and coring help reduce this level of thatch when done regularly. We also groom the greens weekly during the growing season which also help reduce the thatch a little.

Below are some photos to show some of the work done.

Core holes in the 9th green

Top dressing the 18th green

Filling up the top dresser

Renovations next week

The course will be closed on Monday and Tuesday to allow the greens staff to perform the renovation of the greens and collars around the greens.

Week 1 of the Men's Champs

That is the first week of the Men's Championships over. The course held up pretty well and with the wind particularly on Sunday there were not many low scores. The greens were slightly slower than was planned as the green staff were only able to single cut the greens due to a break down of one of the greens mowers on Thursday. With the windy conditions though this was maybe not a bad thing. Ryan, who cut the greens both mornings would have been up super early starting at around 5 am each morning to keep ahead of the field on both 9s. The plan is to double cut each morning next weekend if we can get the second greens mower back in action.

I went around each morning and had a look at the bunkers before play and still noticed most of the rakes had been placed on the edge/slopes of the bunkers. Can players please place the rakes back in the flat of the bunker so that it can't trap a players ball on the slope of the bunker. Can we all work in educating our playing partners each week to put the rakes back in the flat of the bunker. (This is one of my pet hates if you hadn't noticed)

The Thursday crew have continued the pruning of low branches. They have started on the 1st, 10th and 2nd holes. This helps in maintenance enabling the mowers to get around the base of the trees more easily and helps speed up play with less looking for balls. This also helps with the health of the trees and opens up the areas beneath to encourage grass growth. The group will focus on the couple of groups of Casuarinas along the edge of the dam on the 18th hole. These have become large and block the view of the dam. They are also difficult to mow around. The low branches on these will be pruned and the groups thinned out a little to make mowing around then much easier and enable some view of the dam. You will have also noticed that a number of trees on the right of the 6th down to the dam have been pruned and some trees removed so that you can see the dam from the tee and see balls going into the water.

The hazard margin behind the 6th green has been brought in to the edge of the track and a drop zone placed on the bank at the back of the green. The drop zone can be used if you need to take a penalty drop from the hazard or you can play the ball as it lies without grounding your club if in the hazard.

Course Update

We are now at the height of the growing season and the greens staff and volunteers are flat out try to keep the grass to a playable level all over the course. We are now cutting greens 6 times a week and grooming 3-4 times per week. The greens will be double cut with the groomers down both mornings of the men's club championships as they were for the Spring Classic. A turf growth regulator (Primo) is being applied to the greens to regulate the vertical growth and encourage lateral growth of the grass. This should also help reduce the growth of the greens throughout the day and provide a more consistent surface for all players. The regular grooming of the greens also help reduce the seed on the Poa Annua which is prevalent in our greens. Cam is also going to start spraying the greens a chemical to reduce the presence of the Poa and suppress the seed head which is unsightly this time of head. It will be difficult to eliminate the Poa all together as it is spread throughout the fairways and rough and continually gets walked onto the greens spreading the seed.

Fairways and tees are now being mown 2-3 times per week which is using considerable labour and putting more hours on our machinery. Cam is also planning on spraying the fairways and tees with Primo to reduce the vertical growth and reduce the frequency of mowing required.

The rough: We are currently cutting a first cut of the rough at around 37 mm and one mowers width which is around 1.5 metres. The next level of rough is cut at around 60 mm using the Lastec trail behind mower. This mower is being used to cut out to the tree line on all holes and with the 7 floating heads you should have noticed a more even an better finish to the rough. This mower is set to cut slightly shorter than the Wide Area Mower (Large Toro Rough mower) which is set at around 67 mm. You should therefore notice the second cut of rough is slightly shorter than the same time last year. The Wide Area mower is then used to cut rough outside of the tree line around the fairways.