The weather over the last few weeks has been kind to us and we are seeing the benefit in the condition of the course. Certainly, the weather has helped the recovery on the Greens and we are getting them back to their best.
As always, through the coming month, the growth of grass means the ritual of cutting Fairways and Tees along with the Rough is daily and as always a big thanks to both Allan Beaumont & Alan Puddyford for their support
In the last couple of weeks, I have been able to visit my old golf club and take the blades from the mowers and use their grinding machine free of charge to sharpen them all which is benefitting the definitions we can get
We have also been and collected some Feed & Seed from Tony Hanson’s work and this was worth around £2,000 which as we all know is fantastic in saving us money as well as making the course better. We appreciate all he does in getting this for us.
We have purchased approx. 100 more sleepers. These are from another source. We have bought these from the last of Liam Ridgills Captains donation and were able to pay £5 per sleeper. This is exceptional value as the average cost is £13 - £14 each.
We will be using these along with the others we have to create better winter tees that will allow us to have a measured course in the future and play competitions along with saving wear and tear on the main tees.
We are also going to use them to refurbish the 8th Tee front.
We are progressing ahead with the drainage project albeit slower than first anticipated. The contractors have had some interesting challenges with what is buried on the course, including the chain from some old conveyor belt (we think)!
As most of you will have already seen, the spoil coming from the drainage work is being piled behind the current 18th Tee.
We have been given a £500 grant from York County Council to support the work we are undertaking on the drainage project and Mark has been able to negotiate a deal with contractors to put pipes in and fill the second part of the 18th Fairway along with the shape and build a tee from the spoil. This will be elevated up some 2 meters so you will be able to see as much as possible into the dip. We are looking to use some of the sleepers to create a walk up onto the tee.
After reading several positive comments from members who like the proposed new layout from the recent trials we have done, it was thought sensible that whilst the contractors were on the course doing work it would be a good idea and cost-effective way to have the work done.
Whilst it may appear presumptuous, we believe that it is progress for the course, adds length to increase the Par of the course along with ensuring that members will be able to enjoy playing the hole twice from differing tees.
The pipe and filling of the ditch will be as wide as the current fairway and in addition to this, we will be also covering the first part of the roadway with topsoil so that there is only the access road that is not covered as advised in the ‘trial layout document.
Lastly, next month’s schedule will be similar in terms of cutting and I will be taking the Tees mower blades to be sharpened next week, work will continue Spiking and Scarifying all Greens & Tees as this is currently being done on a 2-week cycle.
We have also had a Baroness Fairway Mower on Trial / Demo recently and we are getting a further 4 different machines to trial over the next 6 weeks.
Now we have some more sleepers, we should hopefully be able to put an additional bridge over the 6th ditch near to where the mounds are that replaced the ‘old pond’ as it seems this is a ‘popular area to go to!
We will look to spray all the weeds in the semi-rough and around the greens and where possible between the fairways to keep the daisies etc down. This is usually a bi-annual job as last year and next year we concentrated on fairways.