Greens Information update September 2011.

Winter rules have been introduced earlier than normal due to the varied weather we’ve become accustomed to this year.

As many of you know Littlestone has a climate that is slightly different to the rest of this corner of the South East of England. One of the beauties of golf at Littlestone is we miss a fair proportion of the rain  that hits the South East, but this also has it’s down side. Most of our fairway growth is during March and April, but unfortunately we had no rain from the 2^nd week in March until the 3^rd week in June.

Malcolm Grand, Head Green keeper, is pleased with how the fairways have held up, albeit they are not quite what we are used too. Most areas are beginning to recover and have been given ‘a helping hand’ with some over seeding, slightly earlier than normal for Littlestone, hence the need to protect these areas with the introduction of Winter Rules.

There will be a considerable amount of work again this winter on the walk on / off areas from tee to green, and we would ask that wherever possible golfers disturb these areas as little as possible.

Greens.

During this winter the greens will be cut to 4.5mm. This will a gradual change over the next couple of months from the 3.5mm we have at present.

Tees.

The men’s 17^th tee will be levelled and re-turfed and the steps replaced, once work commences we will use the old Yellow Low Tee, which has been re-instated for this purpose.

Following all the positive comments from members and visitors alike after last winters use, the old original tee at the 8^th will be levelled and re-turfed this Winter. It will give us the option in the coming years to have extra teeing ground on the 8^th.

We will continue to use the current Blue Tee at the 7^th for the foreseeable future. The greens committee will be considering various options to replacing the ‘White Tee’

John G Young

Chairman of Greens

20th September 2011