Monday 6th January 2014.

Groundstaff will be working on the removal of invading couchgrass into our putting surfaces over the coming weeks.

This will be a slow process with care needed to remove all couch and make sure that replacement turf from our bentgrass nursery is properly installed to give it the best chance of survival.

The couchgrass can sometimes be imported into the green site at time of construction or has been known to send runners from the surrounds areas several metres away to get to the putting surface site.

Putting surface with couch invasion occurring in the foreground.

Care is taken in removing the invaded area and to also remove stolons from below the turf surface.

Once the contaminated turf is removed a clean bentgrass plug from the nursery is its replacement.

We have also been working on the improvement of our teeing areas in the past few weeks. This has involved the leveling of the tee tops with a rotary deck mower. This removes all the unevenness and firms up the tees. Though some areas become scalped in this process, they regrow quickly and help to maintain a flat firm teeing area. This practice will continue over the next few weeks.

Rotary deck mowing unit in use.