CAPEL GOLF COURSE MAINTENANCE

Happy EASTER! Course staff have been busy preparing the course for this weekends Easter Medley, difficult task this week due to the Good Friday public holiday effectively having a 4 day week to prepare the course. I think we achieved what we set out to and the course is in great shape heading into the weekend. The greens maybe a little slower than previous major events but you have to keep in mind the greens were only renovated 3 weeks ago, looking at them you wouldn't know it has only been 3 weeks, I m very pleased with the way the greens have come back, we knew it was always going to be a race against time to have them remotely close to condition for this weekend, while another week would have been nice, I think we won the race in the end. The greens are only 1/2mm off our usual major event height of cut being cut at 3mm, a fantastic response only 3 weeks out from renovations, we are only single cutting and this will contribute to slightly slo...

Under instruction from the Course Director the fairway definitions will be changing slightly, in most cases the fairway will now stop short of the green, some fairways will be re shaped and others narrowed to get a definitive edge between the fairway area and rough. In some cases the fairway definition is difficult to obtain due to a number of reasons, the main being, the rough area not receiving adequate irrigation, shade and  tree roots, by narrowing some of the generous fairways we hope to have a better fairway definition. The other reason for this work is to make subtle changes to increase the challenging nature of the course without adding labour intensive bunkers etc. You will notice blue lines around the new fairway cut area, this is to assist the fairway mower operator hit the line, until the distinction has grown in. Some scalping of areas will occur where the cut has been taken outside the existing line, these areas Will recover quickly with a little assist...

I apologise for limited blog updates lately, as many know my wife has recently had back surgery and during her time in hospital when not staying in Perth, I was making the 4 hour round trip, as you can imagine, organising course work, family at home and taking care of the wife has kept me busy and will do so for some time yet so bare with me until some form of normality returns. Over the past few weeks we have successfully held the Capel Classic with the increased maintenance and grooming that entails, and of course our Greens renovations this past weekend. Renovations went very well, all greens solid tinned (this was due to the close proximity of the Easter event and needing to get the greens back quicker than we would if pulling the cores out). Fertilised and all the goodies applied, prior to this, the greens were verti cut and the couch areas heavily scarified and also undertook crab grass, Saltene and Couch chemical control. The race will now be on to get the...

For the past few years, Golf WA has joined with the PGA and GCSAWA for a combined awards night for the various organisations within the WA golf industry, one of the awards is the Toro Apprentice of the year Award. Anthony had the privilege of attending this years Gala as he was 1 of 4 candidates nominated for this award, while he didn't eventually win the award we are very proud of him and his efforts to be nominated. Congratulations Anthony, well done and as I said to you earlier, Tho you didn't take out the award, it is an achievement in itself to be nominated and one you should be proud of, we are, just rewards for all your efforts.  On a personal note, it is very pleasing when an apprentice you have been responsible for with their training achieves to a level considered worthy of nomination for awards as these, I was hoping it would be 3rd time lucky as this is the 3rd time round for me with 2 past apprentices from over East who also achieved to this level, it is very...

It is nice when all the hard yards have been made and you achieve the results you were after. The course is set up in great condition for this weekend's Associates Summer Cup and with 180 ladies expected it sure is going to be a big weekend with very early starts and some late evenings to keep the course and the ladies happy following the Summer Cup we also have the Vets day on Monday which brings another big field. Sorry but no pics yet trouble with loading. The weekend will also be a good test for the greens recovering from the 8 day no irrigation period, the faster root recovery than expected leading us to resume normal summer maintenance programs earlier than expected. We have lowered the cut to 2.5mm, double cutting for the weekend and are rolling 11ft but we are concerned as temperatures are set to soar over the next 5 days with temperatures between 38 and 40 degrees expected. They will be closely watched over the weekend and once past the major event we wi...

Hello and welcome to this weeks blogs installment for the week ending 26th Jan. Happy Australia Day I hope all enjoy the Australia day long weekend. Or should I say.. Gday mate, av a bloody bonza Aussie Day and your weekend is beaut..... (Cliches couldn't resist) News from the course this week is all positive as we continue to achieve strong recovery growth as condition improve to where we want them to be. As can be seen in the pictures and a casual round of golf all areas are recovering well. Thanks to some lower than expected temperatures over the past 2 weeks, high 20's low 30's combined with management practices during this time the greens are also making a faster recovery in terms of root growth than initially expected, so much so we are starting to re introduce normal maintenance practices for the time of year and recommenced herbicide control for Crab Grass, tho we are using the lower rate with split applications over...

Recovery Work Week! The past 2 weeks has all been about providing conditions for turf grass recovery as much as we can control along with of course normal routine maintenance and course mowing etc. All front 9 surfaces have had wetting agents applied, Green Surrounds cored in addition the 8th and 9th Surrounds scarified and seeded with Rye grass. I am not a big fan of Rye grass, however decided that as it was the turf established in the area and does germinate relatively quickly it would give us some quick grass cover considering the Ladies Summer Cup is only a few weeks away. Some light fertiliser applications to all areas rounds up the broad scale turf recovery. 8th Surrounds cored, scarified, seeded and sanded For the Fairways, Tees and Green surrounds we have done all we can to assist in recovery the rest is up to the turf, time and patience, our goal is to have close to all areas recovered by the Summer Cup. Fwy Dry patch recovering The greens rema...