Continued wet weather is making life difficult still for us to complete project work but also keep the course open for play.
All in all though despite the bad weather, the course is holding up well with only minimal damage in certain areas such as around winter tee positions and walkways to and from each holes. This is acceptable and no different from other years and we all know that come spring these areas recover well.
There have been closures again though and although this is frustrating, it has occured on days where the weather has been particularly foul and likely that many would have been happy not to play.
PITCH MARKS
One area that is becoming an increasing problem is with pitchmarks on the greens. We are seeing more and more of late and this is likely to require repair work to the greens come spring time.
We have worked hard to improve the the percentage of fine grasses on the greens in the last few years, with the aim of offering good quality putting surfaces year round. We have recently reached a point where they require minimal disruptive maintenance, however if the uneccessary damage continues from unrepaired or incorrectly repaired pitch marks, then the kind of disruptive maintenance that we have worked hard to avoid may again be neccessary to faciltate their recovery.
The pictures below show the damage caused, but also the scale of the problem.
We would rather be making further improvements to the course to enhance the enjoyment of all golfers rather than carrying out disruptive hollow coring and overseeding just to repair damage that can be so easily avoided.
PROJECTS
Stage 2 of the work on Snaith’s has been completed leaving just the new bunker to install on the left of the green.
Drainage work on Reddings has also been a success, with the large pool of water that usually collected on the fairway now able to get away into the pond quickly. There is another issue still to investigate though in the rough adjacent to Reddings fairway which we will attend to in the near future.