Today was trying to catch up with the top-dressing and brushing in on the Balcomie course greens which we managed to complete 14 greens with an average of 5 tons of sand per green then vibrate rolled them to help work in the dressing ready for opening the course for the weekend the other greens will be completed on Monday, I'm hoping that the greens will be recovered and be back to playing ok in about 3/4 weeks

other jobs on the Balcomie course - rake bunkers, finish off cutting fairways, change holes, set tee markers and divot tees

Craighead course - Cut greens, cut surrounds, rake bunkers, change holes/markers, finish off cutting fairways and semi-roughs. Tomorrow is the start of the winter Stableford medals

 Yesterday was a day for catching up with machine maintenance ie greasing, checking cutting heights and sharpening the hand mowers as outside was blowing a gale and heavy rain

 It's only been 3 weeks since we hollow cored and seeded the putting green and now you can see all the new seed germinated in the core holes

 Today we started back on the aeration work on the Balcomie greens which was to continue hollow coring, cleaning up, double verti-cutting, cutting then disc seeding hopefully tomorrow will see these jobs completed then we can start top-dressing and brushing in

We had a demo of mini hollow core units that can fit on your greens mower to see how they would work on our greens

 This week we have the Balcomie course closed to let us carry out essential aeration work to the greens, first job is to verti-drain down to a depth of 9" to help air and water movement and help promote deep rooting

 next stage is to hollow core with a 1/2" tine to take out excess thatch and rough grasses

 then clean up all cores which we are using on hole 14 of the Craighead course to level of an area so we can cut with mower plus it will be safer under foot for golfers

We have hired a core collector for the week as it saves so much time and labour, hopefully these jobs will be completed in the next 2 days weather permitting then we will start verti-cutting, over seeding and top-dressing to back fill all the core holes. On the Craighead course we cut greens with grass boxes off as still lifting fert, raked bunkers and moved tee markers then divoted tees, started to cut fairways and levelled off the area where the cores are getting dumped.

 Turf ironing on the putting green to smooth off the surface after the verti-draining yesterday

 Another irrigation burst at hole 17 on the Balcomie course

The greens on the Balcomie course had their monthly application of wetting agent plus iron and seaweed which has really greened them up

 Autumn is nearly here the trees leaves are starting to go brown and drop off

 More aeration work carried out on our putting green to a depth of 8" to help create fissures/cracks which will help in air and water movement by reducing compaction, the Balcomie greens turn next week

Yesterday was the BIGGA greenkeepers autumn outing at Piperdam golf club which was a great day and congratulations to Shaun and his staff for the great condition of the course

 Yesterday we applied our Autumn feed (5.5.10+5fe) to the Craighead greens then watered in at night

Balcomie
Greens cut, semi-roughs cut only the hard growing areas as growth has slowed down, bunker faces cut/cleaned/blown then raked and carried on scarifying and cutting fairways which is a slow process as we are collecting all the grass clippings so that's fairways 9, 10, 15, 16, 17 & 18 completed this week so far plus the fairways have to be dry to carry out this work.
Craighead
Today we left the greens as they were fertilised, greens were checked for worm casts etc, greenside bunkers raked, tee markers moved, fairways  and semi-roughs cut and the resurfacing of the road to our shed is now completed this task would of been completed sooner but work on the courses comes first so we have only been working on road in the afternoons.

Our plans this week are to lightly scarify the Balcomie fairways each afternoon when the turf is dry then cut and collect all grass clippings so fingers crossed it stays dry all week

We are now starting to reduce cutting on the greens and turf ironing instead with the growth slowing down which should still give us a good putting surface, wont be long and we will be looking out the woolly hats and long johns.

 What great dry weather we have been having which has allowed us to catch up on small jobs ie trimming sprinkler heads and irrigation boxes

 We have been out fertilising weak areas ie walk offs, round bunkers, weak tees and the 2nd fairway on the Craighead course

Other jobs have been to continue with resurfacing the road which we have been carrying out in afternoons after courses set ups etc, with the temperature dropping slightly we have reduced cutting on our greens and rolling or turf ironing instead and will be raising the heights of cuts in the next couple of weeks

 That time of year again for us to cut out, mark and top-dress winter greens on the Craighead course

 

More aeration work on the greens this week 

 

 



 This morning we cut greens and surrounds then sprayed them with a liquid fert and wetting agent on the Balcomie course other jobs were to cut tees, divot etc, cut fairways and rake bunkers

This afternoon we made a start to resurfacing the road to our shed with recycled planings and whin dust to help fill in the potholes then compacted down with a road roller

 

Balcomie course

At last some aeration work on the greens, we slit tined, cut, sprayed worm irritant/iron on the greens, changed the holes, cut tees and divoted etc, finished off cutting the semi-roughs and collected the balls off the driving range

 

Craighead course

Turf ironed greens no cutting to give them a rest, cut surrounds, cut fairways, start cutting semi-roughs after completing the Balcomie course and strimming work

 

 This morning we finished off work at the putting green, other jobs on the Craighead course were to cut greens, cut tees, divot tees etc, cut 3.5" roughs and start to cut bunker faces.
Balcomie course cut greens, rake bunkers, check tee markers and cut 3.5" roughs then after break the staff headed up to Drumoig golf course to the Toro demo day to see and try their new equipment.

We have extended the 9th fairway to the right and grew in rough to the left on the Balcomie course to help protect the 10th tees which are down the left of this hole

 After cutting we vibrate rolled and turf ironed to help gain surface speed on the greens

 Our putting green has suffered from the wet summer which has left some thin areas so we have hollow cored, seeded and top-dressed and will leave it closed for 2 weeks then we will verti-drain to help allow air and water movement in the soil profile