All greens were dusted on Monday morning this week with the prediction of showers throughout the morning being thought as a benefit to wash the sand into the putting surfaces. The morning showers didn’t prevail, but the thunderstorm that rolled through around 12:30pm washed this sand in perfectly. The dusting of greens is a light top dressing of sand which is another cultural practice employed by golf courses to manage and thatch buildup in putting surfaces. Greens will feel firmer following the dusting, and the trueness and smoothness of the ball roll will be maintained.

All greens were treated with wetting agent and soil penetrant products this week in an effort to help increase filtration rates of the putting surfaces which will enable surfaces to dry down quicker and produce firmer putting surfaces. The wetting agent is designed to evenly wet the soil profile and reduce hydrophobic soils (dry patches). This is important not so much for the start of this week, but more for the warmer temperatures on Thursday and Friday.

The thunderstorms have disrupted progress on the 7^th tee this week as materials were too wet to work with. The irrigation has been modified on this tee so that the new bank at the back and side of this tee will receive irrigation, and to also ensure the 19^th green surrounds isn’t getting over watered. The new surrounds of the 9^th green received it’s first cut this week, with just a small section on the left hand side still too wet to get the mower across it. All in all, the turf on the 9^th green surround is establishing well, but it really needs a solid week of full sunshine and warm weather to spark it along.

All going to plan, we hope to be laying new turf on the 7th tee pad and surrounding banks on Tuesday. We will be ready to go but it will depend on availability of turf from the farm and their ability to cut the turf if the paddocks are dry enough. We will once again have the tarps installed to protect the prepared soil bases of this tee from the predicted thunderstorms on Friday and over the weekend.

Our volunteers were on course Monday morning finishing the hedging at the 6^th tee area, edging concrete paths, trimming fairway sprinkler heads, whipper snipping the 6^th and 19^th creeks, divorcing fairways, and assisting with the cleaning up of bunkers after they were trimmed on the 2^nd and 3^rd holes. Thank you gentlemen for a productive mornings work, very much appreciated by everyone!

This weekend we will be cutting and rolling greens on Saturday morning, and then cutting greens on Sunday morning. We will be cutting greens both mornings this weekend.

Have a great weekend and happy golfing!

The Course Team.