The Duke’s Green Keeping

Hi All,

We have had the pleasure of welcoming a couple of new additions  to our team this week, a new Toro 5610 fairway mower and a Trimax Merlin rough mower.They have both been put to work already and are great additions to our team!.

Our seasonal staff are settling in well and are getting through the increased workload that comes at this time of year when the season is fully underway and grass has gone crazy over the past few days due to the brilliant sunshine we are experiencing. The daytime temperatures have been great but its the nighttime temperatures into double figures that we have been waiting for.

This week we have  applied granular fertilser to the greens (19-5-19) and approaches(23-2-10), with the current warm weather, it shouldn’t  take very much time at all before all the playing surfaces are uniform, which has been a struggle this year due the the cold conditions. Once we get uniform growth on the greens, tees and approaches we will then be applying some growth regulator to control the growth a bit more.

As mentioned in the previous post we have been completing the aeration work to the tees by top dressing and seeding them before an application of a 23-2-10 fertiliser to ensure that when the seed germinates that it has some nutrients to allow it to establish. Getting seed to germinate is easy, its the establishment that takes a bit more consideration.

Another one of the tasks to keep on top off at the moment is bunker edges. They can grow very quickly with lush growth at this time of year which not only looks untidy but also is very time comsuming to trim back if left too long. Once we have trimmed the grass back we spray the edges with a growth regulator to slow the growth which allows us to take care of other areas of the course without having to utilise a lot of time and effort into the bunker edges.

Lots of mowing going on at the moment with the course is really starting to shine now that the sun has decided to make its appearance, long may it continue!.

Derek