To The Hesketh Arms BC Committee and Members
I hope this update finds you well and you are getting into the swing of the bowls season.
April has started off where March left off with lots of wet and windy weather, in fact as I write this is looks like we are in for some more blowy conditions early next week.is
My cutting regime for the green is now in full swing and I cut the green on Monday, Weds and Friday mornings. If there is a competition on a weekend I will also cut the morning of the comp. I received some positive feedback about the green after last Sundays first competition of the year, which is always nice however I never take it for granted and I am always looking at taking the green to the next level!
At present the green has a large amount of grass coverage, however not all the grass in the green is welcome……if you look closely when you are next bowling you will see some of the grass has little fluffy heads on them. This grass is called POA and is weed grass and one we don’t want too much of in the green. POA blows in on the wind and takes hold very quickly and has the ability to self-seed itself and those fluffy seed heads impact the roll and smoothness of the green.
So how do we deal with it I hear you ask?
Over the next 7 days I will be attacking the POA by means of Verti-Cutting. This method involves changing the cassette in the mower to one that enters the green vertically and instead of cutting the grass in a normal way it will pull out all the bad stuff and leaving the good grasses alone, the amount of ‘rubbish’ that will be removed is always a sight to behold especially when you also look at the green and it would seem I haven’t even done anything!! Weather permitting, I will be doing this Sunday 14th at around 6pm If anyone would like to see it in action.
Following the verti-cutting I will then apply a liquiq feed to help with growth and to give the good grasses (fescue and bent) the nudge to fill in where POA has been removed.
I am conscious that the season has now started and trying to fit in these processes without it impacting a team or match is very hard, so if id does affect one of your games I am sorry!
The bare areas are still slow to get going and if no germination is noticed within the next 7 days I will re-evaluate and think about a soil transfer (remove some cores and replace with better soil) Thanks, Andy