Tuesday 28 February 2017

Sand Stripping

As part of the 5 year ecology report recently submitted by the STRI work has begun on stripping the rank vegetation from areas in the rough. The plan here is to scrape away the grasses and underlying soil to reveal clean sand. The soil/grasses are buried deep in the hole and covered with clean sand to a depth of 750mm. The bare sand area is then left as it is for the natural plants and fine grasses to colonise it over the next 7-10 years. Weed seeds will not germinate in the sand which will allow the finer Fescue grassses to establish over the coming years. This has been trialled at several courses and has proved very succesful. These areas are now integral parts of the course and a ball should be played as it lies from the sandy area. These areas at 7/8 and the 12th holes are the first to be done and we will monitor how they develop over the coming months. The area at the left of the 12th fairway was covered in rushes and very penal if a ball landed in them but now a ball will be found and can be played from the sandy area.



Gorse Clearance

We have started the removal programme on the gorse area between the 1st hole on Balgownie and the 4th hole on the Silverburn Course. This is a large area that will be removed over a period of 4-5 years. The plan is to cut an area then allow it to recover before clearing the next plot. This will reduce the negative visual impact there is when we clear the gorse. By the time we reach the 1st tee the area behind will have healed and regeneration will have started.

Friday 17 February 2017

Rough management- Replacing pop-ups

To progress further with the rough management programme we are replacing the fairway pop-ups that sit in the semi rough with part circle heads. At present the old heads rotate 360 degrees and water 20mts into the rough behind them. This is not helping progress with thinning the rough areas so these heads are being replaced with new part circle pop-ups that are set to irrigate the fairway only. We have permanently removed 11 heads that were in the rough at the 6,9,15th holes. We will replace 44 old heads with the new ones. There will be a considerable saving in water and run time for the fairways when they are on during the summer months. In the next few years the fairway system will be replaced but we can re-use these new heads on other areas in the future.


Thursday 2 February 2017

15th Green side Bunkers

The green side bunkers were completely re-built. These faces were first built when the green was moved in 2011. They have lasted well with the front and middle ones getting the ,most use. The middle bunker was altered slightly to remove the nose in the middle. We had issues with blown sand in this bunker when there was a south east and north west wind blowing. The angle on the face was softened slight;y to make play ability easier.