12/11/12 Pics

Fence

New fencing on the Pro courts and from the back driveway gate to route 9.

Despite the heavy rain, the loam screeniong is continuing.

Loam Screening

Started a big project today. Much of the grass court soil that has been stockpiled on the property for decades is being screened - taking out rocks and roots.  

Jennifer commenting on Wislon's recent brick work.

Wilson has been doing some masonary work around the property - here are two interviews.

w

Early Snow

The nets are still up on a couple of clay courts, but the snow will hamper play for a couple of days.

Pics, 11/5/2012

As noted in an earlier post, our last aeration of the season is with the Vertidrain.   Large, solid tines go down about ten inches, kick and fracture the soil.  Andrew cutting court 18. Charlie, Neil and Vic removing clay court topdressing in preparation for next season. 



Great picture from Wimbledon groundsman's diary (blog).

Old fence coming down on the Pro courts - new fence should be in place next week.  Nate building a new landing area at the bottom of the side porch steps.

Storm

Not too much damage at LCC from hurricane Sandy.  Posts on the Route 9/ Hammond St fence snapped and are being repaired.

Windscreens

Windscreens taken down on clay courts - high winds predicted for Monday. 

10/24-10/25, 2012

The grass courts were aerated again, but this time with longer tines on the Vertidrain.  Over the years we have been pulling cores out to a depth of 3 1/2 inches. Just below this depth a compacted layer can form.  Jeff is using coring tines that are set to a 5 inch depth to break up this layer.  The bottom picture shows the courts topdressed after the cores were picked up - with the topdressing filling the holes and covering the bottom of all the grass plants.  We have one aeration left for this season - large solid tines on the Vertidrain that will go down to 10 inches and crack the soil.  All of this is aimed at producing a deeper root system that will improve both plant performance next season.

Friday night's thunder storms dropped over two inches of water onto the courts in a short time. The result was a lot of erosion and a layer of silt on all of the clay courts.

LCC Trees, 10/18/2012



Dawn Redwood



Light green tree in foreground - Sophora

Linden

Today's Pics



Middlesex Road oak tree




Cores ready to be picked up after rain



Japanese Maple



Mandevilla made it through the weekend freeze



New lawn growing in well





Nate getting ready to sharpen his Halloween cleaver



Grass Tennis Research

Dr Scott Ebdon, turf management professor at the University of Massachusetts has begun a research project on grass tennis courts.  I will be supplying frequent updates with details on this multi year project.  The Longwood grounds team will be helping out where we can and last Friday's assistance can be seen below.  

Four singles courts are being seeded with different grass species, blends and cultivars.  They will be maintained just like LCC's courts - mowed the same, same fertility and pest protection, with real and simulated play.  Which ones will wear best?  Dr Ebdon will find out.  

The four courts were carefully seeded in 32 randomized sections (the cage keeps the seed in each section) with four sections of Longwood Poa annua for comparison.  We brought out 20 trash barrels of aeration plugs and soil from our courts - you can see the LCC crew spreading them in the grids. 

This is a very exciting project for turf and grass court managers!  Lots of valuable information should come out of this - the first ever grass tennis research in the US. 

Did you know that the grass under the nets gets mowed almost every day?  That's 50 posts that need to be moved!

Pics/Updates

 New lawns at the pool, Dunster St embankment and clubhouse/garden area are growing in quickly.

 

The Golf Course Superintendents of America produce webcasts every month on agronomic topics.  Yesterday Andrew and I watched Dr DaCosta of UMass give a presentation on winter injury of turf.  There is a great deal of new research coming out on why winter injury to turfgrass occurs and on the management techniques you can implement to help prevent it.  The webcast provided a lot of this new information.  Yes that is Andrew pictured in one of the presentation slides.