4 minute read
AGRONOMY UPDATE
Well, I do hope you have all been enjoying the last few weeks of weather, it has certainly increased in temperatures which is a good thing for certain aspects of both courses. The increase has helped both the Bermuda and Paspalum improve in their growth rates and seen the courses recover well after the cooler months when grass does grow a lot slower.
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As we know the Majlis greens are still not a year old yet and now to settled. This in turn brings a few things to certain parts of the greens. There has been comments about the edges of greens and want to assure you it is nothing to worry about.
Some of edges did struggle due to a multiple of factors.
1. Shade – When the grass doesn’t get enough daily sunlight it can affect the growth and cause the grass to be under stress and die. This happened on the putting green when we had the hospitality structure, which was only allowing some of the green to have a few hours sunlight a day.
2. Water Movement – Greens are settled, and water moves across the surface and can sit for a little longer. The closures during the summer where we do our hollow coring and heavy topdressing for the first time will help prevent any of this going forward.
3. Traffic – Areas of greens that have high traffic from walking onto and off the green can be stressed when in the period of slow growth.
4. Surrounds – The surrounds and green edges have now settled and during the summer there will be extensive work to level any areas that are uneven.
There have been several things we have done to combat these factors now. We didn’t want to just turf the areas as this wouldn’t help us get to the bottom of why grass might be struggling, so it has been important to monitor and change the way we do things.
Major work always happens during the summer and this year will be great to get onto the greens with some aggressive work to really set us up for a great golfing season.
One area we adjusted already was the back of Hole 4. The surround was too high against the green edge and so we removed a large amount of soil so that water distributes better on the green and we don’t have a bowl effect.
We have started to regularly leave the greens clean up cut. The clean up cut is a cut that goes around the edge of the green. It is the area that gets the most traffic from a mower, as you cut across the green and then you do the clean up cut at the end to make sure it is tidy. You may think this is scalping but its just we have not done the clean up on that particular day, as needs to rest and recover.
We have implemented more work now on breaking the surface to encourage better water distribution and getting oxygen to the roots. We are seeing great growth as a result.
BUNKER SOFTENING
As was communicated in the past we were able to put drainage into all our Majlis green side bunkers last summer. The reason for doing this is so we get better water movement through the bunker and so we don’t have compaction due to water sitting on the surface. This has worked very well and have seen improvements throughout the course.
We have also been very proactive for the past 6 months in making sure the greenside bunkers are tillered every week. This attachment goes on the back of the tractor and rotavates the sand to help keep softness and so we can remove any stones we may find. This is done every Friday morning so we keep out bunkers as consistent as we can. Throughout the week we also use a bunker machine in the bunkers with some extended teeth on the underside of it, so it maintains this softness aways. All green side bunkers are then hand raked, so they are presented in the best possible way.
Every effort to keep the bunkers in a good playable condition is done by the team and we appreciate the positive comments we have received from members of the club.
TRANSITION
Now that the temperatures are increasing you will start to see the rye grass in the rough on the Majlis start to struggle and eventually die. We have been proactive in encouraging the Bermuda grass under the rye grass and already seeing positive signs in quite a few areas.
The focus for us over the next few months is to make sure this process is as smooth as possible. We have already needle tined and sliced the rough to encourage the Bermuda and will be adding sand where needed.
The team appreciate all the support over the last few months and look forward to keeping the courses up to the standards expected.
Happy Golfing.
Matthew Perry Golf Course Superintendent
