GOLF
17th fairway
View from the 1st green
long road of writing report after report and producing spreadsheets, to off er a wider understanding of the costs and everything involved to get to where we are today. I will sit down with Ben Waters, our Golf & Estates Manager to prepare our budgets. Ben moved here from St. Mellion Golf Club and has been in the job for eighteen months now since Linda Goddard retired after twenty years in the position. We have built a great working relationship and he is very professional. We will go on course walks to discuss various issues and it’s great that he sees things from the same perspective and has a similar vision to me. Once we have put our budgets together, they will go to the Managing Director and then the Board of Trustees. So, there are a few stepping stones, but we are a charitable trust meaning all profi ts go back into the club.” Helping Nathan maintain the course are: Martin Coe, Deputy Golf Course Manager - NVQ level 2 and 3, PA1, PA2, PA6 spraying certifi cates, chainsaw certifi cates, twelve years’ experience. Terry Ruse, Assistant Greenkeeper - NVQ level 2, powered pole pruner certifi cate, twenty-nine years
experience. Matthew Frost, Assistant Greenkeeper - NVQ level 2 and 3, PA1, PA2, PA6, chainsaw certifi cates, six years’ experience and Charlie Blatchford, Assistant Greenkeeper - NVQ level 2 and 3, PA1, PA2, PA6, chainsaw certifi cates with seven years’ experience.
The parkland course is clay based with USGA spec greens, originally designed in 1991 by Martin Hawtree. When Nathan took over, the profi le of the greens were in a pretty bad state with a lot of black layer, thatch and compaction. “We have a lot of mature trees surrounding the course which also results in shade and airfl ow issues. A combination of all these conditions was causing a lot of disease and led us to bring in Laurence Pithie from Turf Master One Ltd, who off ered his advice, expertise and implemented a programme to help reduce thatch. I fi nally feel like we have almost turned the corner.”
“In the past, the greens were overseeded with bents, but we didn’t have the right conditions. We have now reached a stage where we consider the profi le to be at the right stage to do this again. This means that
Originally, the designers planted tens of thousands of trees and they expected 60-70% to take, but we had a 100% success rate
From left to right: Terry Ruse, Matt Frost, Nathan O’Sullivan, Martin Coe and Charlie Blatchford
26 PC October/November 2020
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