Greens Update - April 2024

Hi everyone!

Without wanting to jinx anything it does look like a bit of kinder weather is on its way, after Monday next week. I don’t think we are out of the woods just yet with regard to the rain we’ve been having, but the fact that the Jetstream is moving north of the UK should mean that a more settled period of weather may be set to appear. ET rates are on the up (how much moisture evaporates from the surface), and so hopefully we will see us dry out a bit quicker in the coming weeks.

Patience is the key for everyone right now, what little we all have left anyway! It has been a very frustrating time for everyone. The greenstaff have been very frustrated over the winter period as they have not been able to carry out all the work that was required on the winter works list. And now the grass has started to grow, and we are not able to drive the heavy machinery around to cut the course down to its correct heights.  So, when you see this kind of picture at Augusta, it can be quite demoralising. The majority of the work being carried out at the moment has been with rotary and cylinder walk mowers, which is very time consuming for the staff.

Figure 1: Fairway mowing at Augusta

Figure 2: How many people does it take to rake a bunker?

We need to carry out maintenance work on the greens, however that in itself has been challenging as again most of the machinery needed out on the greens hasn’t been able to travel safely around the course. The greens need a verticut, a good brush and topdressing is required to help smooth out the surfaces as we enter the main playing period. Again, patience is required as it will not happen overnight, however we feel confident that within the next couple of weeks we should start to see an improvement.

We have a granular feed waiting to go on, but we don’t want to apply the feed and dressing before verticutting, as it would bring it back up, resulting in a waste of time and expense. Therefore, the greens have had a couple of liquid feeds to keep them ticking over while we wait. Some greens look a little weak, however they are all growing and a nice amount of clippings are coming off at the moment.

The 2nd green has had some localised work done at the back to help reestablish some grass cover on the area which was affected by the constant waterlogging. And the 5th green has had an extra feed applied to it to help fill in the scarring from the winter disease.

The tees have started to grow well, and they are looking good after their extended winter break. We must be careful to spread the wear as we reintroduce them back into play for the season. The tees will also receive some topdressing and brushing work when the course is fit, and that goes for collars and approaches.

Figure 3: Wildflowers in bloom. Remember when the sky looked like that? Us neither!

We have bought some wildflower seed for some areas around the course, notably two of which will be the right side of the 18th tees and the patch of land between the tees at the second hole. The initial clearing work was done in the winter period, and now is the time to weed kill the area as new shoots of growth start to appear. (I did try to start this yesterday, however the wind picked up and so the task was aborted until next week).

Once this regrowth has died off in a couple of weeks, the areas will then be given a light rotovate before the seed would be applied, using sand as a carrier. Then hopefully we can sit back and watch these areas develop into colourful wildflower havens.

The bunkers will have more sand put in to top them up for the season and the new sand for the reconstructed bunkers on the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd will be going in shortly. Some of the other bunkers have suffered with a part of the face collapsing, such as on the right had side of the 7th. We plan to start repairing these next week and the new turf has been ordered in preparation for this.

Overall we have everything in place for the start of the season, apart from the ability to physically do some of the work. We will remain patient as we know we can turn things around very quickly, once we are able to maintain the course with all the equipment we have.

Thanks for stopping by!

Steve

Head Greenkeeper