June storms

Although we still have a week of June to go our rainfall chart show that for this year so far, June has been our wettest month.The recent storms across the south east caused many issues locally  including South Essex with the entrance to the club flooding and much of the course deluged for most of the day.

Most of the bunkers flooded after 58mm of rain,much of it falling in a very short time span,some paths were washed out and debris was washed across some greens.What is referred to as the Bomb hole on the 2nd Heron which had no water in it Wednesday was full by Thursday.There was some marking up from golf carts on path ends on Friday but the sun shone and we  cut all the greens, tees,aprons and some fairways  and the course was being enjoyed by members and societies.

Course Furniture

We have recently updated some of the course furniture on the course , and on the putting green new pins are in place hopefully golfers will take more care of them as some of the previous ones were snapped.

On the greens new cups ,pins and flags have been put in place to give a good standard of presentation  to the green

The greens were recently sarel rolled and top dressed  to aid smoothness and then sprayed with a soluble feed

New bunker rakes have been put out to replace those broken or damaged


To help clean and tidy up the course we have been around with the strimmers along ditches and posts

One of our regular tasks is divotting the tees to help in there recovery from wear by adding and dressing in soil and seed.

 Some of the recent thunderstorms passed over the course, these sudden downpours quickly fill up some of the bunkers requiring us to pump them out so that they can dry out and then we can get them back into play

The flower bed by the clubhouse provides a nice contrast of colour and is attracting many bees to feed on the flowers

In July we are hosting an educational seminar and course walk for Essex Bigga  green keepers on golf course ecology

You will notice on the Heron and Hawk greens we are testing what are called  hole stabilisers these are plastic inserts which help define the hole and make it more visible from distance,it will depend on how long they stay intact and in good condition as to whether  this is something that we will consider for regular use as the cost will come into it

April May issues?

The past two months have been difficult for the green keeping team.The loss of two members of staff at short notice meant we were only able to give our full attention to the main key areas of play like greens,tees and fairways.Other areas only received sporadic attention while we went through the process of recruiting,interviewing and appointing new personnel to build up our team.
We are now able announce that Steve Rowley has joined us from Bishops Stortford Golf Club as my Deputy,He has over 10 years experience as well has holding NVQ ,spraying and chainsaw qualifications


                   Steve Rowley

We have also appointed Francis Lesser to our team  who has completed a diploma in Horticulture at Writtle college ,although he has no golf course experience he is keen to learn and has already started working on the course.The old water bowser has a good wild flower mix following on from the spring bulbs out side the Maintenance building  were Francis is standing.                                  

We have been working on tidying up areas that had not been targeted for a few weeks ,so all the bunkers have now been trimmed and edged and a total weed control applied 

All the range has now been mowed after certain wet areas had been left to dry out.The greens have been sprayed with a selection of products consisting of soluble fertilisers and seaweed.We hope to top dress the greens in the coming weeks.The course is now coming back into shape.

Matt and myself attended a Bigga educational event recently at Channels Golf Club to see the changes being made to the course as large areas of land have been sold for housing development.New holes are in the process of being laid out and greens and tees being built with much of the work done by the staff on site, as they have the experience, machinery and equipment on site to do the work.

Recently all the Crowngolf General and Course Managers attended a meeting  at Cams Hall Golf Club part of which was the annual awards,though South Essex was not on the receiving end.  

               Cams Hall Golf Club house

Five months in the making or more like 5 months in the waiting a short video (in HD) taken in Stonyhill wood showing the short life cycle of the bluebells on the course this year.

Last task for Nick

One of the last tasks for my Deputy before he left was to erect the new trellis fencing  underneath the verander.It was one of those days when you experience all the seasons in the space of a few hours.

Sunshine one minute 

Sleet and hail the next

But the job was finally finished.

All the Greens have been sprayed with Soluble feed with some seaweed and growth control added .We are now spraying the fairways with some feed and iron to boost there recovery after scarifying them.

At the beginning of April we introduce Craig Brindley to the green keeping team but unfortunately we had to allow him to leave so we are now busy recruiting a new Deputy and Assistant to bring back the team to  full strength.

The next few days promise some sunshine and warmth so will see some Spring growth 

And good views around the golf course.

There are times when all green keeping experiences and knowledge have no relevance to some of the tasks we have to be involved in and it can be a case of the phrase "Jack of all trades"

       below we are repairing potholes after wear and rain through the winter weakens the road

                          Here we are inspecting the Maintenance Building Roof Guttering 

 

           and below we are finishing off the drainage work behind the range to create a channel for water to enter the new waste pipe we installed

On the course we have solid tined the greens and applied a wetting agent  which was nicely washed in by the rain.This was followed when the greens were dry with a sand top dressing to help fill in the scarify lines.

On the Fairways we scarified and brushed  them in the opposite direction to our normal mowing pattern so that the grasses would stand erect and remove the dead vegetation and moss.

 My favourite spring time flower is seeing the bluebells come out in all there glory and can be seen around the course on all 3 courses as you walk pass the woodlands

 My Deputy Nick Roberts will shortly be leaving Crown Golf and South Essex to move to Farley Golf Club in Surry as a Deputy  and we wish him well in his new position as well as congratulations, as he will be travelling to Eire to get married to Victoria who works at the Hertfordshire  as Sales Manager

New staff member

We welcome Craig Brindley to our Green keeping team who joins us after working at Royal Norwich Golf Club.We trust he will enjoy his new role at South Essex.

We have over seeded the greens with a fescue bent mix and then sand dressed them before finally brushing it all in to the sward.

We hope to lightly scarifying the fairways  and then apply a soluble fertiliser with iron to give some nutrients and colour this week.

One of the flower beds in front of the clubhouse has been renovated by digging up the perennial plants and splitting them up,weeding the bed and then replanting it and add Woodchip,the spare plants were moved to another bed

  

 An area close to the fence near the road by the 4th hole vixen has been cleared and tidied up,

allowing a clearer view up to the 4th tee from the road so that car drivers can see if golfers are about to tee off.

 

     Below an interesting early morning colourful sky

march renovation

This month we have stared our renovation work on both the Tees and Greens.As most of the tees are in play over the winter they suffer  from wear and damage in the wet and colder weather.To aid recovery we have carried out aeration work in the form of solid tining,followed by scarifying and brushing,fertilising with a slow release product then over seeding and dressing.

The greens were likewise worked on with our main emphasis  on removing thatch by scarifing and blowing off the debris,mowing to clean the surface before topdressing with sand and brushing that in.A liquid feed of soluble fertiliser was applied along with other beneficial products to aid recovery,Although the temperatures both day and night are low which slows down grass growth and therefore slows down the recovery period.

This photo shows the green 8days after the work was completed

We will over seed the greens before apply another dressing of sand to firm the surface and restore levels .

Bunkers have been treated with a total weed control to keep them clean,but one of the main issues we have with bunkers is that they are generally at the bottom of slopes so that rain water runs into them from the surrounding land contaminating the sand with silt and clay deposits.This gets mixed in to the bunker sand and forms a mixture like cement which greatly hinders drainage.We have been working on a few of the worst ons to try and improve the drainage in the short term.

Near the driving range we have installed a new drainage pipe to remove water from the down pipe and ball wash area.Upon investigation we found that a gully pot had been installed for the down pipe but no drainage pipe had been installed to take the water away.