Reading The Green Part 2

Welcome again to my second instalment of the golf course blog reading the green. It has been a busy few months on the course and we are seeing the fruits of our planning and implementation of the course development plan. One of these sections are the bunkers. Every golfers favourite part of the course. I personally believe that bunkers should be classed as the second most important part of the course behind the greens themselves. We are lucky to have had in our management when the course was being redeveloped the foresight to bring an interesting style of bunker to parkland golf. This truly enables the golfer to experience all aspects of golf. Our bunkers are strategically positioned throughout the course to shape the golfers game on the day. Again the design of the course has a number of holes that don’t have any bunkers. This shows you the strength and depth of the golf course as a whole.

The Links style bunkers on a parkland golf course is not uncommon but different. Most parkland golf courses have high sand splashes or high bunker faces so you can see them off the tee etc. With this style of bunkers you have intensive maintenance regimes especially during the winter time. You have a lot of wash-outs and sand movement off the faces. With our style of bunkers from a maintenance perspective you don’t have these issues. However you can now the have man hour to prepare the bunker bases to a high standard through-out the year. Again, future proofing the course maintenance and the golfers experience by installing a permeable layer. This ensures that the sand is kept free from and foreign debris that could migrate through the soil into the sand from below the bunker base, It also aids in draining the bunker a faster pace.  We have steep bunker grassed faces in place. The ball strikes the bunker face and rolls back into the bunker. Not always but a high percentage of the time. Don’t forget bunkers are hazards and getting a uniform lie in all bunkers is very unlikely. That is were the skill of golf comes in. I wish you all a great golfing year ,  hopefully you have taken some information off this to get a informed synopsis of our bunkers here in Luttrellstown castle.

Yours in golf
Trevor Dargan
Gold course Superintendent