The most damage tends to come from having both sports on the same weekend. Any damage caused by the football on the Saturday doesn’t get a chance to recover before the rugby on Sunday.
RENOVATION works began on Tuesday 7th June after the last concert had been cleared away. This allowed us a period of just under 8 weeks until our pre-season friendly against Tottenham on 30th July. First task was to Koro the surface to a depth of 15mm to remove the existing vegetation and organic layer. This was also to expose 20mm of the Desso fibres which had become embedded in the surface. This took most of the day and achieved the desired result in one pass. The next task was to pull a meadow rake through the surface in numerous directions to remove any remaining vegetation/organic layer and to stand up the Desso fibres. This was closely followed behind by a tractor mounted sweeper to remove any loose debris. The next morning was spent
carrying out more raking and sweeping until myself and the consultant were happy we had a clean surface. Once this was achieved, Kestrel verti-drained the pitch to a depth of 200mm to relieve compaction caused by the season’s play and the concerts. The pitch was then fertilised with a Mascot 6:9:6 pre seeder.
On the Thursday the pitch was
ready to be seeded. We had chosen a Rigby Taylor R14 ryegrass mix into which we had added 10% slender creeping red fescue. We included the fescue in the mix to act as a filler around the base of the ryegrass as it establishes. We chose the Rigby Taylor mix because we had such a success with their R11 mix at our training ground. The seeding was carried out using 10 bags firstly in two angles lengthways on the surface with Kestrel’s Vredo disc seeder. This was followed up with a further 4 bags put on widthways with a Charterhouse pro-seeder. Once seeding was finished I spread 8 bags
of Activate R granules from Rigby Taylor. This is a potassium humate based feed to aid germination and root growth. We had been very fortunate with the weather and the whole operation was completed in 3 days which gave us a fighting chance of being ready for the start of the season. The first cut was carried out after 13 days from seeding, once the grass had reached a length of approximately 50mm. This was carried out using our Honda rotary mowers at a height of 35mm. We used the rotary mowers for 2-3 weeks until the grass was strong enough to be cut using our Dennis G760s. A couple of days after the first cut we fed the pitch with 14 bags of Mascot 12:0:9 and a further 8 bags of Activate R. This was followed up by a further application of 12:0:9 and a 14:2:7. We also sprayed a liquid application of Aminosorb F, Activate F and Breaker Triple wetting agent. Due to the high temperatures we
have experienced lately in the south, we have had to water the pitch more often than we would have liked. This combined with other factors led to a vigorous outbreak of leafspot. We sprayed the disease with Dachonil, but had to follow this up with a further application of Iprodione. The disease led to a large amount of die-back in the leaf of the plant which we will verti-cut out once we have got our first two games out of the way. It also slowed up the growth of the plant and didn’t allow it to mature in the way we would have liked. With only a week to go to the first
fixture, the plant is only now beginning to show signs of new unaffected growth, but is still very weak in the corners of the pitch especially. We are now relying on our Desso system to keep the sward intact until it is mature enough.
Machinery List
Machinery based at the stadium: 2 x Dennis G760’s with cutting cylinders, brushes, verti-c
cut units
2 x Honda HRD536 rotary mowers 2 x Hayter Harrier 56 rotary mowers 1 x John Deere 4100 tractor + trailer 1 x Wessex rotary deck 2 x strimmers 1 x Flymo
1 x Scotts pedestrian fertiliser spreader 1 x 4” Dimple marker 1 x spray marker 1 x 6’ brush for tractor In process of buying a Toro Procore 648 pedestrian aerator Anything else needed we hire in
Honda Rotary in action
Seeding
Koroing to a depth of 15mm
Meadow raking the surface
Removing loose debris
Vertidraining to a depth of 200mm
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