Covid - 19 so far......

Strange times, mowing fairways, greens and tees for no body to play.. The sad truth is that the course has never looked so good... The lack of traffic and wear and tare really helps the course, bit obviously its a double edged sword.

All fertilising, spraying, mowing, aerating cant stop, and truthfully its a chance for our greenkeepers to get ahead of the curve. Thanks to all of them for the tireless work in strange circumstances.

Today Thursday the 9th of April, we lightly sanded greens. This is an effort to even out the surface, and reduce thatch. We hope to do this weekly for a month.

Saturday the 4th, I got my 11k steps in, spreading slow release granular fertiliser over the greens. This high grade fertiliser, will slowly feed the greens, through the roots, while we spray to top up the feed. We put out a really strong dose, after purchasing a pallet load to feed the greens. You can already see the difference. 

So whats ahead, we have sprayed a number of fairways, and all aprons for weeds, along with all tees, they also got a granular feed which last longer that liquid. So we have to topdress the tees and aerate them. We will aerate greens again, and as previously said sand them little and often over the next few weeks.  We have a few more fairways to spray for weeds and we are hoping to divot mix fairways while we get the chance.

On a personal note, I really hope everyone is taking this Covod-19 serious, minding themselves and their families. If any of our older members need anything, you should have all gotten a text with my personal mobile number just give me a call and I will drop whatever you need off..

Stay safe, and wash your hands. 

Colm. 

Last week of March ahead

Its been an odd few weeks over Covid-19, but golf is still ok to play. Certain restrictions apply and we are busy, yesterday the 22nd of March, was something else.

We are hopeful that a number for these people coming up, who may not have played the place in the last number of years, or golf for that matter, will consider joining course and club, and take up golf. The sad truth is that this may be one of the best things to happen to golf for some time.

On the course, we have gravelled the footpaths on the way to the first hole and the 2nd tee. We need to get the 8th green to 9th  tee done this week.
We also bought a 2nd hand pedestrian topdresser, (sand spreader). Makes our lives a little easier on smaller tee boxes. We have sand ordered so all tee boxes and greens will get sanded soon. This is just after a micro hollow coring of greens. Tees will be micro solid tined now, maximum air, minimum disruption.

All tees and greens got a liquid feed on Friday morning, we are waiting on granular feed to arrive, couriers are slower than normal. Then all greens will receive a good feed. Tees got granular last week also, so we are pretty much set up for the season now.

The Drive - In 2020

The Day before the Drive-In

Its March 7th, third times a charm. . We had one of the most if not the wettest February on record. An incredible amount of rain fell, 254mm in the month. The monthly average is approx 75mm. Bar it being obviously very wet, the course has taken it well. The positive side of the month was, with the reduced traffic, alot of areas, have healed well, just in time for the drive in. They needed the break and its helped alot.

This last week or two we have gotten alot done on the course, even if we could only start mowing on Tuesday. We have the first of our tee signs erected on the 1st hole. Sponsored by Eirjet, a local aviation Company. We have installed a lovely flower bed underneath it, this will be the case on our premium holes, 1st, 7th, 10th, 17th &18th.  We have a number of sponsors lined up, but there are still a few holes available, if you or yours know of anybody. Premium holes are €500, with standard holes €300. Call 061-313655 and look for Colm, to get more information on it.

With the Drive-In this weekend, we just want to wish our Mens Captain Derry Hennessy, and Ladies Captain Trish Hynes, the very best of luck in the upcoming year. So far we have had a very good start to the year and I know with these two at the helm. We will have an excellent year, working together as a team.

The Drive-In, is tomorrow morning, Sunday the 8th of March, @ 8:45am.
See you there.

2nd week of February

The weather has been cat. Two storms in two weeks, we havent had any significant damage, but havent gotten much done on the course!!

A few days ago I asked if people wanted us to start a blog, specific to the course and works on it. They said yes. So here it is.

We've gone through Storm Ciara and Storm Denis, very little damage to trees or anything, but a serious amount of rain. We have new puddles which we havent seen before, due to the amount of rain that has fallen in such a short period of time. As of this being written, Monday the 17th of February, 117.6mm of rain has fallen for the month so far.. To give you an idea of how much that is, the average is 76mm for the month. We've had snow, sleet, hail, you name it we've had it the week gone. 



Obviously with all this poor weather we haven't had time to do much on the golf course. We have instead concentrated on working in the machinery shed yard and Clubhouse. This gives us a chance to reorganize the shed so the greenkeepers can work more efficiently. It is important from time to time that we take time to do this and it will pay dividend come summertime. We've also spent a lot of time planning. Looking at what work need to be done, how we're going to do it, and repairing equipment to keep it in best condition.

In one sense it's good that the weather came this week also we have had our Landscaping team helping a local charity project in Annacotty. This charity project is called DIY SOSand it is to help refit a house for a girl who needs it badly with the family. We are landscaping her new garden free of charge it will be on TV later in the year.