Posts

Sustainability in Rosslare

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 Sustainability at Rosslare Golf Links Below, I will be writing a blog on some of the key factors that go towards Rosslare being a highly sustainable golf course. In this developing time in our industry, it is of high importance to be as sustainable as possible and to help combat global warming. Be that from using less fossil fuels, to using IPM practices to reduce the amount of chemicals used on a golf course. Our own Turf Nursery. Having our own fescue turf nursery allows us to be sustainable in regard to sodding and resodding areas on the course. It allows us to produce our own turf and to fill in the used parts when they have been harvested. It reduces the amount of fossil fuels of transporting the turf. Electric Buggies. The addition of electric buggies in recent years, it has allowed us to reduce the amount of fossil fuels that we use. Previously, they had diesel-powered buggies which were very loud and used alot of fuel. Now we have reduced our noise and carbon pollution sig...

Visit to Currcloe and Darcys sandpit

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  With the College, we attended a trip to both Currcloe and Darcys sandpit in County Wexford. We first went to the new grow-in at the new Currcloe golf course, and we saw all the new areas they had seeded in. They also mentioned the fact that they used a method of hydroseeding in certain parts of the grow-in, which was very interesting to me as I had never heard of this method of seeding. They mentioned what they had sown the greens with, primarily fescue-based greens with a small amount of creeping bent.  We also got to see the rough outline of the bunkers that will be present, and I thought they were massive. They also mentioned that they are only hand-cutting greens now and into the future. I was also surprised by this as the surface area of the greens was considerably big, especially to be hand-cutting them. We also got to see their fleet of machinery, which was quite limited as the site is still in its novel stages, and the headman mentioned that they will be getting all ...

Reseeding

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 Second Blog This week we have been overseeing the course. First we started with the greens, initaly vertidraining them prior to seeding them. Then we used our in house seeder to reseed the greens. This was a piece of equipment that attaches onto the back of the tractor, sweeps the leaf, pokes a hold and drops the seed into the hole. Then it rolls it to finish it off. Once this has been done a member of staff comes along and swishes the green in order to maximise  the amount of seed that makes contact with the soil.  Then the greens are top-dressed with sand and then they are matted in with a matt on the back of a machine. We have also been reseeding tees and fairways, this was using a different type of seeder called a vredo. This was done using Ecofairway seed mix.  This machine slices a line in the turf, drops the seed in and rolls it to close it up. Personally I think the other seeder does a better job as the vredo leaves quite a mark after its ran ...

Jake Butler ( Rosslare Golf Club)

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My first Blog   My name is Jake Butler and I have been working as a greenskeeper for the past year. I previously worked as a chef upon completing my leaving cert for 5 years. I decided to go for a career change in 2024 and Mark in Rosslare gave me a great opportunity to learn a new trade and now they have given me the opportunity to start the Sportsturf Management Apprenticeship.  My first experience of being back in education has been good so far, getting used to be being back in the classroom and taking notes and drawing diagrams. We have gotten setup on Moodle and now we are starting our blogs, this is a new experience for me as I have never used Moodle or Blogger previously. So far I have learnt a few things such as, The anatomy of a grass plant, We have also been identifying species of grass by their Latin names. We have learnt about how soils are formed from different types of rocks (parent material) from Sedimentary rocks, Metamorphic rocks and Igneous rocks. Depending ...