Paint and Carts

We are gearing up for painting the fairways March 1st.  We have been out spraying the entire golf course wall to wall with round-up to kill anything green in the roughs and fairways.  Our plan is to start here at RNK then move to Brickshire then move down to Stonehouse.  Fairways will be hit and miss with cart path only we will do our best to get you back on the fairways ASAP.

We also have been out still cleaning the course from under brush and native areas.  I have noticed a lot of carts in the native areas lately.  Please keep carts out of these areas.  There are drains that have fallen in just like the fairways so deep that you could loose your cart in.  We also have seen an increase in carts cutting across the road from 13 to 14 tee.  Please keep your carts on the path all the way around through the tunnel.  ALL FOR YOUR SAFETY!!! Kevin

3000!!!!!

We hit 3000 views this week!  We created this blog about 1 year ago this week and 3000 views make it worth the time and effort to keep you informed about whats going on in the turf world of Royal New Kent Maintenance Department.  If you ever need to ask questions please do so!  Kevin

12 Clean Up

We have spent the first couple days this week liming up the good trees, removing all the dead trees and under brush on hole 12.  We plan on seeding these come spring with a No Mow Type Fescue to help with looks, erosion, maintenance, and it will let some air and sunlight in these areas to help with seed germination. We have also done the hill top behind 17 green and hope to get good results from that as well.  By removing the old mulch and debris from these area and seeding them with low maintenance grass will eliminate the need and expense of mulching.  Kevin

What to do, What to do?

We are in that middle gray area of the winter where it's too wet to do the big work that needs to be done and the not cold enough for the ground to freeze.  We are starting to in prove on the little things we can like liming up trees along cart paths and around tee and green improving air flow around these areas.  We have been removing the final bit of leaves and debris around the course as well.  Simply put we are doing all we can until the weather gets to the point to allow us to do the big projects.  Don't forget to sign up for the Super Skins on Sunday, call Lester in the proshop. We have about 20 teams ready to go with lots more room for you!  Kevin

2.5 Inches of Rian

We got 2.5 inches of rain over the weekend making the course a wet mess. We are cart path only on holes 1, 10, and 11.

The rain has put us on project hold so we are doing some much need clean up around the course.  Picking up more leaves and liming up trees.  We really need to dry or get really cold and the ground to freeze, we have way too much to do this winter to get ready for a great 2015 golfing season.

Things on our list to do:

- Fix as many sunken drains as possible
- Remove junipers off hole 8
- Clean wooded areas
- Repair and re-do driving range
- Add drainage to #10 fairway and the approach on #18 green

We Still need to make time to spray out all the POA (all green stuff in fairways), paint fairways and a bunch of hand work on slopes and ditches we can't bush hog.

Kevin

Food For Thought!

Check out this video to get us do our jobs better!

 www.youtube.com/watch?v=nM4LATAn_tk



Kevin

Burn

If you live near the course you probably either seen flames or the intense smoke from the controlled burn a couple weeks ago.  The burn went pretty much as planned.  We did have one small wind change and the fire went a little crazy on eight.  But the good news is the fire department was quickly on it and controlled it very fast.  There was a ton of old thatch down under all the tall stuff.  We hoped to burn the native areas 100% clean but the thick thatch acted like fuel and burned too quick to get all the tall stuff.  I walked some of the burned areas yesterday and was super excited to see green shoots coming out and recovering great.  We do have a little more to burn on 7,8, and 9.  We plan on trying to complete the burn in the middle of this month.  Kevin