Course Update
The courses continue to play and present well with all surfaces presenting consistently and in alignment with our expected standards for member events, club championships and pennant rounds.
Our Course Audit and Improvement Programs are successfully continuing with the current focus on completing the drainage tasks, before moving soon to the bunker renovation/restoration tasks. See more detail with some supporting notes from Michael Cocking (OCM) under this section of the report.
Our very important and exciting MAR/ASR Water Scheme has commenced with Aurecon as our lead project management team. This is supported by Field Development Planning (FDP) as our independent consultant and analysis working directly for PK. Work Package 1 which is focused on extracting the critical information required for the permit applications is now in progress. See the very early and initial progress report from Aurecon., titled MAR Project Update (attached).
As the daylight saving period soon comes to an end, our focus will turn to positioning the turf surfaces for the cooler months. Strong focus and preparation is required here to ensure plant health and recovery potential extends as long as possible into the autumn/winter period. This intent will minimise the dormancy period length of the warm season grass areas of green surrounds, tees and fairways in particular that shut down during the deep winter period (June – September).
Water storage remains strong and available should autumn present warm and dry.
COURSE AUDIT AND IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM
At the most recent Course Audit and Improvements meeting with the Course Advisory Group (CAG), it was agreed that the following outcomes will occur:
- The conclusion of this 2022/2023 program and remaining budget funds will be utilised on drainage installation and bunker renovation/rectification.
- All future program work from the 2023/2024 budget will pause.
A bunker audit has been undertaken in conjunction with OCM together with the detailed property drainage plan that will support and guide all future work for bunkers and drainage programs. This has included all of the comments members have contributed and made in the members surveys on the courses. This detail will be presented to the CAG at the conclusion of the bunker program in May.
It is to be noted that OCM have advised PK that they will have limited resources available for the remaining 2023, 2024 and the 2025 years due to high project work locally, interstate and internationally. However, they are available for PK if priority work, project investigations and reviews are required.
It was also agreed that during the pause phase it would be utilised well by the Course Team to consolidate and undertake general maintenance programs focusing on detail works consistent with the Course Policy Program and standards expectations.
The operational budget has an allowance for the drainage and bunker programs to continue.
A new focus on bunkers will soon commence. This program will focus on selected bunkers where entry/exit points are added and/or restored, along with additions of sand, a control strategy for sand loss through erosion, and native sand addition to faces for increased firmness to reduce incidents of plugged balls. (See bunker review comments from our Course Architects below).
Michael Cocking – OCM
Quite surprisingly in the next year or two we will mark the 10 year anniversary since we started work on the redevelopment of Peninsula Kingswood. This has been one of the most enjoyable and rewarding projects we have ever been involved with and it has been interesting to see how the course has matured and evolved over the many seasons. Golf courses are constantly changing as weather patterns alter the grass and vegetation, wind and rain shifts sand in the bunkers and waste areas and golfers play and explore the golf course – whether as was intended or not!
Perhaps the area most susceptible to change on any course are the hazards and it’s quite common to see bunkers deepened or the shapes significantly altered through erosion and play. Peninsula Kingswood is no different and there are now a number of hazards where sand has shifted or bunkers have deepened (anywhere up to 75 centimetres) which has affected both access and play.
After considerable site investigations with Glenn Stuart and his team, we have found a good supply of native sand close to the turf nursery just right of the 3rd North which will allow the worst affected bunkers to be topped up with sand. As part of this process bunkers where plugged balls are occasionally an issue will be addressed, with the native sand (which tends to pack a lot firmer than important bunker sand) used to line the face of the bunker.
In reviewing some of the bunkers most prone to erosion we have also suggested splitting them in half, or in the case of the 8th North right greenside bunker, into three. There is no change to the appearance from the tee or approach shot, but the ribbons of turf dividing the hazards help reduce erosion as well as allowing for easier access.
Drainage
Our annual drainage program continues to advance well. The next set of areas that are to be completed include:
- 5 South Green Surrounds (Hole was taken out of play for 1 day on Tuesday 21 March)
- 13 North Tee Carry
- 4 South Tee edge and adjoining wasteland
- 12 North Wasteland
- 1 South tee carry path edge
It is expected that the drainage program will conclude at the end of March.
Tee Carries and Out of Play Areas
This month we have begun undertaking our annual ”lowering” via a tractor mounted slasher of select tee carries and out of play vegetation areas. In some of these areas of vegetation we may also include and undertake a controlled regeneration burn during autumn. These combined methods continue to provide great success in regenerating a wide range of native heath and grass land plants species so important to the ecological value for the flora and fauna on our site, as well as to control density levels, weeds and undesirable plant species.
BOUNDARY FENCING UPGRADE
Our very high priority program of securing our boundaries to minimise the risk of external intrusion and facility vandalism continues. The very high-risk areas along our northern boundary using new high strength fencing is well underway. The area along the Monterey High School is complete (see images below) together with a section adjacent the 11th North tee. The next area for replacement in the coming weeks is in the northeast corner adjacent the turf nursery.
WARM SEASON GRASS TURF DISEASE PATHOGEN UPDATE
As reported in 2021, 2022 and again in the 2023 years, we along with multiple other clubs are again seeing the same turf fungal pathogen disease called “Fairway Patch Disease” (BF1) on the couch grass areas across selected fairways. This has again been at its most active in February and March. The disease continues to present as circular rings but will subside as the daylight length reduces, soil temperatures lower and cooler weather arrives from April.
We have begun the implementation of purpose designed nutritional inputs and colourant programs to grow out and mask up the visual impact until it goes into its dormant phase from autumn. It is expected that inputs across our warm season grass areas will be required to combat this challenge and reflected in future budgets.
There remains no known cure or effective product control for this fungal pathogen.
We continue working hard as a collective and in a collaborative way with other clubs and industry disease experts to gather knowledge, limit its effect, or find a cure that will see out its cycle. There have been some encouraging reports from clubs in NSW and VIC that have had it for many more years that it is subsiding naturally with time. Government funding also may be sought through our clubs/associations to seek the necessary technical assistance to counter this challenge. Many clubs in NSW and VIC and as far as NZ continue to experience the same challenges.
Greens Collar Treatment Program
During the months of April/May of 2023 we will commence a control program with the objective to alleviate warm season grass (couch grass) encroachment into our greens collars.
This program will selectively control/contain the warm season grass without impacting the desired bent grass turf. The program will require three applications three weeks apart in autumn and spring annually.
Members may recall or have read our strategy and challenges in past updates, or seen the encouraging trial works in progress over the past 2-3 seasons. The manufacturing of our only previously registered product ceased in 2020, and a new product option or improved version of our trial product will soon enter the market. This has now been confirmed for the early weeks in April and a product information session has been conducted for the industry of intended users on behalf of the product manufacturer. We have been working closely and diligently with global turf weed professors to find a sustainable product solution that eliminates the need for a disruptive full turf replacement program. We are now at a point that we can confidently implement this program after years of responsible trial work and access to a new product.
Expect to see a strong highlighting of the target plant impact when the program is in the early weeks of implementation. The tips of the target plant will turn “bright white” before it decays. See below photos of the trial work that shows the program effectively working.
Glenn Stuart
Director of Courses