One of the great things about my job is that I get to spend time chatting with turf managers. Last week I had the pleasure of working at Royal Cinque Ports Golf Club, as part of the awesome support team, supporting James Bledge and his fine team.
James and his team prepared a first class golf course and myself and group of Course Managers, Consultants, Deputies and friends came down to help him deliver a great course. We just helped with the finishing touches really...
So still hoping my greens mowing skills were up to scratch after a few years away, my Bearwood Lakes uniform now way to small after not racking up the steps anymore.... (by all accounts you can track them now, Matt P !!) I helped prepare the golf course which looked superb.
Evidence below if anyone wants it
One of the things that struck me that week though was the amount of pressure, golfers, members, media etc put on greenstaff to produce surface to the highest specification all year round, not just for the club champs. It seems now that players want surfaces to perform as good in November as they are in June.
At Syngenta we are also seeing much more discussion internally and also with customers about Anthracnose and I think the two are probably linked. Anthracnose is in many cases a stress related disease and of course we should first look to IPM strategies to deal with this. However with golfer pressure, events and fixtures this is not always easy. We have produced a simple bulletin below which might help prevent this disease, we hope it might be of some use.
07085-TSL-Anthracnose-Update
More importantly, the other thing I learnt last week, is that you cant beat a greenstaff team for top banter. It was all very lighthearted, everyone got involved (as you can see below, as the two apprentice greenkeepers turned up for tournament prep), but it reminded me why being a Course manager is one of the best jobs in the world and the staff work very hard in a rewarding and enjoyable job!
Anthracnose et al
