2023 Coring No 1 – Wed 1st & Thurs 2nd March
After being washed out twice in 2022 we were finally able to core at the very beginning of March. Luck was on our side as a great deal of sand had been mistakenly dropped in the car-park and the Romsey Sporting Association President, Rob McIntyre, told us if we could shift it we could have it. A quick call to Cam Newnham and all was organised. The sand was dropped beside the Red 11th tee and behind the 2nd green. The team from Australian Turf Management arrived at 7.00am and were quickly into the job. They had to change tools on a few greens, where we had turned the irrigation off but generally the morning proceeded well. The sand proved to be almost perfect, free draining and quite happy to drop down into the core holes.
Sevi, Bruce and Hugh did spend a few days raking smaller stones off, piling them up on the side of the green and then using them to fill holes etc on the tracks. A pain at the time but, looking back, really well worth the effort. With our little front-end loader, “The Bulldog”, virtually destroyed in the fire of Sept ’22 we hired a Kubota tractor with bucket from Kyneton Hire. It did a heap of work over the two days.
Lorraine continued her work repainiting and cleaning up the tee signage and distance markers. She also made sure she got pics of all who worked, that is all bar herself.
Scott spent most of the afternoon cutting squares of Santa ana turf into bare spots on the 8th fairway
On the 2nd day the greens were again swept then seeded, fertilised and watered in. The cores, which had been dropped at marked locations were pushed into these low spots, levelled off and compressed Other loose soil was also moved to fill holes in other sections of the rough.
Mal, Kev, Mitch, Tyler and Clive sorted the drain in the west side of the 6th green
Jenny and Wendy sorted out a few recalcitrant weeds
Loading the sand proved fairly straightforward
Sevi was everywhere, checking the sanding, helping with the weeding, organising the seed and fertiliser and painting the markers on the ends of the larger cross-overs.
Hugh, doing his best impersonation of Stan Laurel, cut a power of grass along the eastern drain
After weeding, Wendy found time to organise morning tea, magnificent cream kisses, and then lunch
The team from Australian Turf Management cored, picked up and sanded every green. Great job boys.
Bruce, reliable as every, charged up the rough mower and then headed out
