Bush Hill Park
Course Manager's Report , 7th March 2024
It appears that we are heading into a bit of a drier spell of weather for the next week, so fingers crossed this comes true.
The team are desperate to get out and get the course cut, presented and playing how we all want but for now we must be careful not to create more damage to areas that just aren’t yet ready to be worked on.
The team have been very busy and their daily step count rising significantly this week with all greens, tees and approaches hand cut with the lads. We have also started to strim greens surrounds to give the best surfaces we can though I am hopeful of getting some of the heavier machines out by the end of the week. We have even managed to get some of the drier fairways cut today!
The past month has been a tough one weather wise. We have recorded 183mm this year to date with 115mm of that falling in the last three and a half weeks. At this point last year, we hadn’t reached 70mm so as you can see, we have been under the cosh.
We have had to go into part closure on the course to at least get some playing activity. It is certain areas that cause the most issue; the left of the 6th rough and fairway gets very wet and there is a damaged drain on the approach that effectively closes the hole. We are going to put in two new drains on the approach to help this situation and we have recently uncovered a storm drain in the trees on six, which we have cleared and is running well; this will dry out the left off the fairway about 150yards from the green.
We also have a very wet area right of the 8th green and in front of the 9th tees. We will be looking to solve this problem over the coming months. The 10th approach is very wet and soft also. We have repaired a broken drain in this area that will help though I believe we still have some other damaged drains under the surface that are affecting this area.
Once these areas are improved it means the course drying quicker in the future and hopefully this will reduce the need for long spells of course closures.
As you start to get out and around the course, you will hopefully notice some of the jobs we have completed over the last few weeks. The bunker face reconstructions on 4, 7, 8 and 14 are completed and look very good. Leigh and Bernie have done a super job having achieved an extremely professional finish.
We are currently now topping up bunkers with fresh sand as we try to make them play more consistently throughout the course.
We have also cleared some scrub areas with the left of the 10th green, left of 12th green and in front of the 17th tee being completed. We will be hiring a mower to tidy up the over overgrown areas around the course with significant focus to the ditch on the 11th hole.
We will be soon undertaking our Greens maintenance week; from Monday 18th March.
We will be hollow coring the greens and following this up with top dressing.
Whilst we are working if you come across us, please pick up and move onto the next hole.
If everything goes to plan, we should be completed by Wednesday, but this rarely happens if machinery or the weather has its say.
We will be in the meantime Verti-draining the greens prior to this week. This is essentially deep spiking the greens. This allows us to break through compacted parts of our greens rootzone allowing pore space for water and roots to get deep into the profile. This is the only process we haven’t carried out in the last year as our tractor and verti-drain were not up to the job. The tractor has now been replaced and the verti-drain repaired so we should be good to go.
The greens verti -drained will be ironed after to make the greens as smooth as possible though some bumpy putts may happen in the short term, this though is a necessary evil for us to be able to keep the greens to the highest possible standards this coming season.
To finish, I would like to thank all of you for your patience throughout what has seemed a never-ending winter.
I have at no time felt under any pressure to make poor decisions on the course status, which is very rare in the golf industry.
I can promise you all that the team and I are determined to repay your patience by presenting and producing a course you are all proud of over the coming season.
Damien Bowe
Course Manager
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