LCC Grounds

LCC Grounds

Longwood Cricket Club Grounds

LCC Grounds blog began in 2008. Entries have educated membership and the public on the crew, agronomic techniques, horticulture and clay court maintenance.
We really enjoy what we do and hope the readers of this blog get something out of it. Questions , comments and any feedback on the content is highly encouraged. If you are from another club, or grounds department, please do not hesitate to contact us!

For those loyal followers of this blog, we want to let you know that our focus for social media updates concerning the grounds department will be on Twitter, where you can follow us @LCCgrounds. You can also follow us on instagram here: LCCGrounds

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Monday, September 26, 2011

Overseeding








The Dunster Road side of grass court 21 was overseeded with ryegrass last week. Pictured are Nate and Jeff preparing the seedbed, topderessing/overseeding and the ryegrass seedlings. We did this because this edge was worn thin from traffic throughout the season. Click on the title "Overseeding" for a short video explanation.

Earthworms

Although earthworms are often said to be beneficial to soil and plant growth, they are not wanted on the grass courts. Here are some pictures of worm castings this morning. Being sticky and wet, they do not drag away or mow off easily.





Friday, September 23, 2011

Ivy

Ivy finally making it's climb on the terrace fence.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Pruning



The murky weather closed the courts for a little while, but we used the time to cut down three dead trees. This was an old hemlock along Middlesex Road.

Friday, September 16, 2011

Pics from Friday, September 16, 2011



The lads working on the grass courts and the Hellenic College outing on courts 13-24.



Wednesday, September 14, 2011

USGA Animation

We have been aerating the grass courts and there are always many questions on the procedure. Here is an USGA animation explaining aeration.





Beth Israel for Parkinson's

Larry and Paul discussing how to fit 70 players on 14 of the 25 grass courts - outing for Parkinson's.













Tuesday, September 13, 2011

September Flowers

Seviceberry Tree near parking lot and Lantana next to pool walkway.











Saturday, September 3, 2011

Chambers Family

Three items on the Chambers family. Ike (below left) and his son Charlie in about 1932. Ike had been head groundsman since 1884, with Charlie taking over that year. In 1955, Ike's other son Walter took over grounds duties. They are all pictured below - the scans are not that clear, but if you click on the individual pictures you can read the story and captions.



Friday, September 2, 2011

Dr Andy Newell of the Sports Turf Research Institute (STRI) in Bingley, England is the consulting agronomist for Wimbledon and he recently sent me these pictures. The STRI does a lot of the testing of grass species and cultivars and from these tests Wimbledon selects the grasses to plant on the courts. We do a great deal of similar testing here at state universities including UMass. These trials test for many attributes - for Wimbledon wear tolerance is obviously important. There can be huge differences in wear tolerance among grasses that seem similar. The bottom picture shows the machine that applies wear to the grass for testing.







85 Championship

The grass court championship for 85 year old's concluded with a grand final match.