“All you actually end up with is a hard biscuit in the summer and soft goo in the winter, not exactly ideal”
Paul Copsey, Regional Superintendent, Crown Golf
and deliver!
need to install automatic irrigation, the idea being that the clay would stay wet all summer from winter rains. As we all know, this is not the case, especially from a playing point of view. All you actually end up with is a hard biscuit in the summer and soft goo in the winter, not exactly ideal.
Subsequent installation of a very poor specification irrigation system in the early 1980s satisfied the summer customers but, not surprisingly, just made matters worse for winter play and for business. From 1994 the foundations were laid for a much more considered and better budgeted maintenance regime, which continued in the conventional way for a number of years. We had been experimenting with a number of lateral main drains and secondary drainage techniques, such as the Shelton Gravel Bander, with mixed results. We were stuck with the reality that we could never get water through the greens. Digging them up, given the number affected, was a complete non- starter, both financially and for
disruption to play. Trying to move water, or give it the ability to move sideways towards the peripheral, more traditional drain lines we had previously installed with our own AFT whizz wheel trencher, seemed the most practical option. How we were affectively going to achieve this on a busy site, and cost effectively, did not really seem apparent until Gary Mumby brought one of his early Blec Sand Masters to do a trial on one of our greens. I think, at first, he was a little hesitant, as I thing it was envisaged for sportsturf use, but perhaps not golf greens that were normally mown down to 4-5mm.
As with most operations, it is the
preparation and aftercare that are important. The machine and operation of dropping the sand into the slits cut by the rotating blades was very impressive, but we were just as interested to see the potential for recovery time and subsequent performance of the putting surface in the following winter. This trial was very successful and, encouraged by the results, we contracted ALS to
perform the operation in the last week of October 2007.
ALS used the 1.5 metre wide machine on an 80hp tractor on flotation tyres. We were lucky that the greens we wanted to do had areas with reasonable access for turning, otherwise the one metre machine that we had originally used would have been more appropriate. The upside of the extra width however was, obviously, the reduced time taken to perform the operation. ALS had two guys on site and, apart from the Sand Master and tractor, had a Bobcat skid steer loader. another tractor and a Dakota topdresser fitted with a conveyor for easy loading of the Sand Master’s hopper.
The loading element was the key to the
reduced operation time especially as, after initial setting, we were inserting five tonnes of Redhill 28 sand into each green via the slits made by the machine. Most greens were completed in under an hour, with immediate rolling then taking place with a turf iron. The green was only out of play while the machinery was carrying out the
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