This week David Gray brings you his bi weekly HGK blog. As always it's very insightful and I would recommend everyone to give it a read. These blogs are brought to you with the intention of improving communications as to why we do what we do on the golf course and also provide you with better information and knowledge with regards to the upkeep of our excellent heathland venue. We hope you enjoy the latest blog.


 

So we enter May with the hope that things can only get better on the weather front, and according to our weather blogger there is some hope that Spring has finally arrived with some warmer temperatures and a generally settled spell to come. Last week we saw everything from glorious sunshine, -3c and frost, perishing northerly winds and of course Thursday into Friday we had snow!!

Tuesday saw us host the Titleist & FootJoy Club Professional's Championships qualifying. Considering the poor weather on the lead up and a frost in the morning of the event restricting productivity, we still received fantastic feedback about the course.

At this stage of the season like most golf courses we are eagerly awaiting some warmer temperatures to encourage growth. To give an insight into how important this is; a grass plant requires a constant soil temperature above 7C to sustain a consistent growth pattern and enable healthy root establishment. 

This Tuesday I was out doing some testing with our moisture probe and a thermometer. We are still only achieving a soil temperature of 6.3C and a canopy temperature of 8.5C, which was with an air temperature of 13C.

These readings will always be lower during the night, so we are still too low to produce consistent growth. On a positive note the moisture levels are a very respectable 22% and the greens are very firm and are rolling extremely well.

 

Another reason we have inconsistent growth patterns on greens is due to the sward composition. In a previous blog I noted that we have Bentgrass (Agrostis) dominant greens with some underlying Annual Meadow grass (Poa Annua) and Fescue (Festuca). Bentgrass has a more creeping and lateral growth habitat, whereas Poa has a more upright tufted nature. Also Bentgrass gets off to a flier due its deeper rooting which stores more nutrients and moisture over the dormant period whereas Poa has very poor shallow rooting and a higher reliance on moisture so it tends to become stressed out and struggle.

There are several operations we do to level out these early season inconsistencies; from Nutrient input, Top Dressing, Grooming, Rolling etc, but as we continue to reduce our organic matter the less Poa we will see in our sward.

David Gray 
Head Greenkeeper 


  
 
This week sees another of our #WeDeliverMore clinics. This Friday, 6 May is our short game clinic at 4pm.

To book your spot on our short game clinic now, click here.

Our remaining FREE clinics are still available

- Long Game masterclass - Thursday, 19 May 4pm 
- Ladies Fairway woods class - Friday, 13 May 4pm 

Click here to book your spots on any of events above and to find out more about this great campaign.   


  

FREE fitting and FREE lesson with Callaway!

Sound good? We want to help you enjoy better golf this season, which is why we've teamed up with Callaway to offer you the Complete Equipment Solution. 

Every golf swing is different and we're confident that this fantastic promotion will help you get the most from your new equipment. 

Click here to find out how this works in this short video with leading Tour coach Denis Pugh. 


  

Titleist 915 drivers and Fairway Wood special 

This week we are offering FREE club fittings on the excellent 915 product. Drivers will be reduced to £299 (from £329) and fairway woods to £179 (from £199). 

Click here  to book your fitting. 


How does £25 for your old battery sound?

We'll give you £25 when you trade in your old battery against a new Lithium one, or a trolley with a Lithium battery. Lithium offerings are quicker charging, last longer and work out cheaper in the long run - so this is the perfect time to say goodbye to Lead Acid.

Click here to find out more.


Test drive a Motocaddy S1 lithium trolley 

These trolleys now come to you at the excellent price of £399 (£50 less than last year!) 

If you would like to test drive/trial one on the course then please ask a member of our team. 


 

For the latest Junior newsletter, please click here. 

The Juniors have been doing some excellent work recently, with some great results and events being held. 

The aim at Ladybank is to continually improve our Juniors here, whilst incorporating fun along the way.


 

Michael and Liz Stone were the recent winners of the Seniors and Ladies competitions at the club. Michael won the Seniors Handicap Championship with a nett 72 and 64. Liz won the ladies nine hole competition with 19 points.

Here are the scores from the May medal played on Saturday, 30 April 

Ladybank CSS 72 

Cat 1 & 2 
1st - D Girdwood - 78 (12) 67, 2nd - RD Spence - 76 (8) 68, 3rd - J Henderson - 74 (5) 69 

Cat 3 & 4 
1st - W Armstrong - 87 (18) 69, 2nd - D Bousie - 90 (20) 70, 3rd - SR Redpath - 86 (24) 72


Ladybank Ladies - Ladies May Medal 

- M Murray(11) - 71, - J Prentice(21) - 76, - A Houston(9) - 77 

Nine Hole 
- E Stone(20) - 19 points, - E Chalmers(19) - 13 points, - J Malcolm(13) - 11 points


Ladybank - SS May Medal Rnd 2 Hcp Championship(CSS71) - Tuesday, 3 May  

- M Stone(20) - 64, - T Black(14) - 70BIH, - D G Cuthbert(16) - 70.


Match and handicap 

Sadly due to a lack of numbers we have had to postpone our home match vs Drumoig this Sunday. This is sad, as it reflects poorly on our club, that we can't put together a team of ten people to play in a team match. 

The LCL home match vs Lundin was also a real struggle to get 16 players with our M&H team spending several hours trying to cajole players into playing. Thanks to all for playing and an extra thanks for Grant McDougall, Jim Anderson & Bill Paton for stepping in at the 11th hour. We also won 4.5-3.5 and now sit top of the league. The next matches are late September.

Card numbers - We would like to thank everyone concerned for improving their entry details on the scorecards. This makes life considerably easier for our volunteer committee members and can save up to around two hours per week in closing down competitions. We will be keeping a close watch on this going forwards.