This Blog post was written by Assistant Greenkeeper Tim Kaye.

How do, I hope you find this article on my experience at the Saltex turf and machinery show interesting and informative. Thank you for taking the time to read.

On Thursday November 2^nd I travelled to the annual Saltex turf and machinery show which is something that I’ve wanted to go to for a long time. The event is hosted at the Birmingham N.E.C. and consists of 2 of the venues halls full of various stands displaying machinery, fertilizers, seeds etc and many other products, all related to sports turf and grounds maintenance. Like the BTME event, there are various lectures and talks hosted, covering a range of subjects related to the industry.

Upon arrival I was overwhelmed at how many stalls there were fitted into the two halls and how to go about ensuring that I visited all of them, if possible, within a day. After studying a map of the layout I decided to work from side to side as my initial plan of attack. Working my way through the show I stopped at nearly all the stands chatting and picking up information on various products that we use or could make use of both on the course, and products that were of interest to me for my own use at home, as I am a keen gardener and lawn care enthusiast.

One such stand that I believe could be of use at work but also apply at home was the ego battery powered equipment stand, as I use a wide range of their products at home and have been demo’ing at work as I believe there is a place for them on the course. The spokesman I spoke with mentioned that he is a keen golfer and in this day with the development in battery technology he believes that battery powered equipment has a definite place especially for tasks around the clubhouse, which is a sentiment that I share as it would allow us to complete jobs around the clubhouse without causing too much in the way of noise disruption. Although I also appreciate that some jobs such as blowing petrol equipment may be required especially when clearing wet leaves and debris etc.

Other stands with items of interest were robot mowers and range ball collectors, which I know Tom is researching for the maintenance of the driving range and certain aspects of maintenance on the course, such as fairways or wetter areas of the course in winter where we may not always be able to access with the regular mowing equipment.

During my travels, I met ‘Jimmy the mower’ who is a ground maintenance worker, who also creates videos and other content for YouTube and social media platforms. Over the years, Jimmy has reached a high level of fame amongst the grounds and turfcare industry for highlighting issues encountered in the industry and raising awareness of some of the challenges we can face. I have had interactions with Jimmy through social media such as twitter etc, and a few years ago was randomly selected as the winner of patch of the day. This is a weekly competition he runs on twitter, where people send in pictures of maintained turf, or your own lawn and one entrant is randomly selected as the winner on a Monday night. Meeting Jimmy was a surreal experience after all of the interactions on social media, It felt like meeting an old friend and I am grateful for the time that he and his wife spent talking to me about the issues currently faced with the relentless rain and the importance of these events and other shows with education such as BTME.

In conclusion, I feel that events like Saltex and BTME are invaluable as we can learn about new products coming out and how they can be integrated into our working lives. The education available for CPD is brilliant and can give ideas on how to improve working routines, or how to incorporate different practices we might not have thought of.

These events also allow us an opportunity to interact with fellow ground staff as well as product representatives to discuss ideas, relay feedback and find out if there are products becoming available that could potentially improve the way we work, which could cut down on the need of expenditure. I feel that the education and knowledge you come away from these events with is invaluable and that they should be held in high regard and used whenever possible to keep staff up to date with products and current knowledge as well as inspiration of where things may go in the future.

Thanks for reading, over and out.

 

This blog post was written by newly qualified Assistant Greenkeeper Caleb Overhill. Thank you for your patience with the hole closures for our fairway maintenance. This year we top dressed the fairways with 350 tonnes of sand, Assistant Greenkeeper Pete was in charge of this job as he used to work for MJ Abbotts who are a large sports turf contracting company (just down the road). We then brushed the sand using a tractor mounted brush to incorporate it with the grass and into the surface. 

We top dress to keep the playing surface smooth to allow for good ball roll and to control thatch levels by diluting it making for a firm surface, also by using sand it reduces worm casts on the surface, as worms do not like sand-it irritates their skin, this helps us when mowing as the casts can blunt the mower blades.

Additionally, Assistant Tim and First Assistant James aerated the tees and approaches with a hollow core tine and Assistant Caleb and Deputy Luke collected the cores with core collectors which are essentially mini road sweepers. A thank you to volunteer Cliff Dowling for being our wagon driver. The hollow tine means that it removes a plug of turf. We chose to use this tine to keep on top of the thatch levels by physically removing plugs of it. We top dressed and brushed these surfaces to fill in all the holes with sand, this allows for improved drainage on these surfaces as water flows through sand easier, sand dilutes the thatch making for a healthy firm surface, by creating holes in the surface it promotes new grass growth.

The week went well with only a few breakdowns and the weather held quite nicely. These maintenance weeks are essential for the playing surfaces to be the they can and we try to get as much done as possible in every day so that we can go that bit extra and get everything back up and running ASAP, so thank you again for your patience and enjoy your golf.

Happy Easter everyone, please remember to repair your pitchmarks, here's a message from the big man, have a great weekend.
 

Please follow the link for a detailed instruction on pitchmark repair. how_to_repair_a_pitchmark.pdf

January in the bag.

Well at least we can take some solace from this lockdown, it hasn’t exactly been perfect conditions for golf, with another turbulent week of weather. Steve and I have been busy in the workshop, with all the general servicing very nearly complete (plate 1). We also managed to fit our new attachments to the 360 digger, this includes a root ripper (plate 2) for more effective removal of scrub and a land rake (plate 3) to prepare large areas for seed. We will soon put these to work on 9 and 7, when the ground drys out a bit.

Plate 1

Plate 2

Plate 3

We did however have some breaks in the weather and besides the usual course security checks, mowing, wormcast removal, pest control and disease prevention we managed to aerate the greens. This time we used a deep solid-tine, 12mm diameter to a depth of 200mm, with a tight square spacing and 5% heave for maximum compaction relief. Plate 4, 5 & 6 include a great visual insight highlighting the benefits of deep tine aeration.

 

 

Plate 4

Plate 5

Plate 6

The deep tine aeration machine is mounted on our John Deere tractor, which was a new addition to the fleet in 2020. This tractor is super efficient and comfortable tackling long, normally bumpy operations such as this, smoothly. See plate 7 for a cabs eye view.

Plate 7

January’s normally not a great month without the added challenges of COVID-19, but it’s done and we head into February optimistic for golfs return next month. Thank you for your support during these strange times, I better wrap some presents, it’s a very excited 6 year olds birthday tomorrow, how time flies. Until next week, stay safe everyone.

All the weather ☀️🌧💨❄️🌨

Well last week certainly was a mixed bag of weather. The start of the week began extremely mild with soil temperatures pushing up to 12 degrees. This brought on some welcome growth and forced us to cut greens twice, removing two boxes of clippings on each occasion. We also managed to cut tees and approach’s.

The middle of the week saw storm Christoph arrive, providing us with 45mm of rain and some extremely strong winds, our compound fence feeling the brunt of it. This allowed us to crack on with some more machinery servicing and some vital modifications in the workshop.

We finished the week with freezing temperatures and wall to wall sunshine on the Friday. The moles are once again continuing to enjoy the lack of foot traffic and popping up everywhere, no match for Steve and myself however. 

 

 

Sunday morning began with a decent covering of snow which my family and I enjoyed. It was great to lift the kids spirits with what has been a pretty depressing lockdown period for them so far. If it’s any consolation the course would have been closed today, stay safe everyone.

Air is life 🌱

Last week Steve and I completed our first week managing the golf course with just the two of us. As I’m sure you can appreciate this poses certain challenges and restrictions on what we can achieve during the lockdown. Each year we have a jam packed winter schedule with lots of projects involved, that for now has taken a back seat while we concentrate on essential maintenance and ensuring the golf course is as good as the day you left it. That being said we have been super busy completing tasks such as aeration, dew removal, essential cutting, pest control and machinery maintenance. 

Below are two images of the greens following our aeration work. We used 8mm diameter tine’s, to a maximum depth of 75mm, which creates next to no surface disturbance but allows the soil to breathe and drain more freely during the winter months. This process was also carried out on all of the tees.

We also managed to begin the winter servicing and maintenance on the fleet. We carry out all of our machinery servicing in house as we possess the skills required to do so. This is a time consuming process which would normally rely on days with increment weather, although a national lockdown also provides us with that time! Stay safe everyone.

Lockdown #3