Jet Stream Movement?

Just seen this on the BBC weather site, if you watch it to the end the Jet Stream may be on the move North in the New Year....... Hooray!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/features/20857179

Just a reminder this is how my square looked on the 11th January 2012 almost twelve months ago. Just about fully grassed raked, mown and brushed.

Happy Days

Annus Horribilis

Well as we go into the final few days of the year the weather remains the same as it has been since mid April, wet and horrid.  I have been hearing on the news over the last few days that 2012 has been the wettest on record. Well, ever the optimist -though some may disagree- I am looking forward to what will surly be a better year in 2013.

My club Kirkstall Educational will be celebrating our 160th anniversary and there are plans a foot to get development projects on the move and have some kind of a dinner.


After all the Christmas excesses I though I would get out and have a look to see just what a job I face as soon as conditions allow.

Top end of square at Kirkstall reasonable grass cover, needs a feed I recon.

 Bottom end, bare patches and standing water every where.

  It just looks so depressing.

Off I went up to Pudsey St Lawrence.
Above are the Sir Leonard Hutton Memorial Gates at the grounds entrance.

It is a similar story at Lawrence as at Kirkstall, young grass plants struggling and under water.

This is the best view of the square. It is made of Surrey Loam and has not been aerated for a season or two and I fear the roots are very shallow, how ever it has been under water just about constantly since the end of the season. I still cant get on unless I just spike through the water-which is an option I may well take I will work only on the middle of the square keeping off the ends with little or no growth so as not to lift the loam out that has no root to hold it together.

Here you can see how the grass has managed to come through in the grooves the scarifier made but very little else. Next week I will give it some Autumn/Winter fertiliser with a little iron, I need to keep what I have growing.

Just looked at the Met Office weather and we have Yellow Warnings in place for Saturday, Sunday and Monday.

What a pain!

See you soon
Hodgy

Very Wet

 I called in at the ground today Just to see how wet things were and I was not disappointed



I always think Cricket grounds look forlorn places in the middle of winter.

Looking from the top of the ground too wet for the Sea Gulls 

Bottom of square underwater.

Will the ground ever dry out?

And I expect grass to survive in these conditions, it will be frozen next.

Roll on spring!

Hodgy

Back from Holidays

Well I have just returned from a couple of weeks in the Dominican Republic on my holidays it was a nice relaxing break in the sun shine, we have been so short of this year.

View from room window -there's a bit of thatch in this grass, it is bare root planted and growing away in a few days- "If only"

My square on return, it is a long way short of where it was last year at this time. I can honestly say my square has never looked so bad at this time of year so I have a fresh challenge in the New Year, to get it up to speed for the start of the season.

 This is a view of the bottom of the square, germination had just about taken place when more heavy rain came and pools formed and without the oxygen the young plants didn't survive. The top of the square is in a much better state.

It is no use panicking, when the weather warms up a little I will get some more seed in and hope for better things. "If only" I could pop a few bare root plants in?

I purchased a new small camera at the airport, which I am pleased with, the pictures above were taken with it. 

Today has been a catching up day one job I have done is to get as many of the keys -I had stolen-

re-cut, they cost me over £40-00 and I still have more to get cut when I can get hold of originals.

The weather forecast is for a lot of rain over the next few days, so I don't see me getting any further aeration work on cricket squares done over the next few days.

 What a Year 2012 has been a real challenge for Groundsmen.

Hospital checkup tomorrow, then out for a meal with my artist colleagues.

Not sure if I will be able to post again before Christmas so 

A Very Happy Christmas and all the Best for a more favourable New Year to all Groundsmen, Cricketers and Readers of this blog 

Thank you for your interest.

Hodgy

Lost Mobile Phone and Old Camera

Last Friday I was off spiking at Horsforth Hall Park when I parked the pickup on the boundary of the ground, to avoid tyre tracks as the field was a little wet. I got distracted and forgot to lock it. When I returned I had had my Samsung G2 and my Old Camera stolen along with a pair of working gloves and safety sun glasses, with some keys.

 I was only a few yards away from the van. I am pleased to say Vodafone put a total block on the phone so it cannot be used at all even with a new SIM card it is just a lump of plastic now.

I am away for a few days so will sort things out when I get back I need to get my best Camera sorted and a new phone.

What a pain!

Just to put things in perspective

I think it would be poor of me not to mention a Young cricketer who played for Leeds Met

(Who play at Kirkstall) and Leeds and Bradford MCCU and was to be their new skipper for 2013  

Who very sadly passed away in his sleep on Wednesday this last week 

Tommy Hardman

http://www.leedsbradfordmccu.com/

a massive loss to Cricket and the World.  My thoughts are for his family and all his many friends far and wide.

One piece of good news is that my daughter Louise gave birth to my second grand child yesterday a boy weighing in at a massive 10lbs -3 oz's all is well and they will be home today. 

This is a photo from last winter will we be getting some of this before Christmas? We have had some hard frosts this week which will have created some heave which is as good as spiking I just hope my young grass plants survive.

I will be back posting before Christmas

Hodgy

A Presentation to Lincolshire Cricket Groundsmans Association

Its been mostly wet in Leeds since Monday so I have not worked on grounds since I spiked at Old Mods.
Tuesday I had my second visit with Keith Boyce to Headingley to see the new Rugby pitch construction as it happened they were laying the turf and by the time you read this blog they should have completed.

Well it appears that I have reached my free storage capacity for my photos from Google/Picasa/Blogger and I will have to Pay $2.49 per month to increase my capacity I could still post but not photos unless you guys know better? 
I am not sure what to do from here.
Hodgy

Spiking at Old Mods

Monday morning and its off to Old Mods (Modernians) in Cookridge Leeds to Spike their Cricket square.

It was dull but fair and quite windy -it is a very open facility- on my arrival.

This is a ground that I got scarified early and Dave the groundsman here did the seeding, top dressing, etc straight away. As a result he has a decent cover of grass looking rather good for this season.

Here you can see the lines where the wheels have flattened the grass into the softer loam at the ends, it will soon stand up again especially if we have a shower.

View looking back towards the clubhouse and scorebox.

A couple of photos of the results, thousands of holes 1/2"dia by 31/2" deep this will help the roots, exchange air, maybe help brake down fibre and allow any frost into the surface, which if it is severe enough will cause heave and that will help the soil structure.

I said the facility was open and this is the view looking towards West Park. I could see Almscliffe Crag

-though the camera was unable to pick it out- this is a local beauty spot. I remember studying it and painting it a few years back when I did my art A level.

By the time I got the job done and back to base it was raining so I did well for a change.

Happy days

Hodgy
PS my spell checker is not working sorry for any errors. Any one got any suggestions as to what can go wrong with it?

Seed Through at Kirkstall

I was down at Kirkstall Friday to load up to Hollow tine Crossgates Bowls Club and the seed is through.

Hooray!

Also a lot more leaves had fallen.

Nice and sunny on arrival but a heavy dew ment the first task was to dragmat.

Just as I got started the 70/30 sand soil root zone arrived and with 170 bags to walk up to shed it took a little while.

All those cores to pick up good job I have a Sisis Auto-Roto  Rake with a brush fit.

Well that's a start

Doing OK when a few drops of rain start to fall, head down and get finished before they start sticking to the surface

Job done, load up and off

Finished product.

Off to do some more solid spiking today Cricket though.

Back later.

Hodgy

Visit to Hurrell's Seeds

Tuesday the 6th November I paid a visit to Hurrell and McLean my seed suppliers, to sort out some invoices, see what they are up to and find out whats in prospect for 2013.

I was taken on a visit to their farm where they have put massive investment into a seed drying plant and this season of all they grow their first crop -all be it a small one- of agricultural rye grass.

Here you can See Nick Gladstone Hurrell's MD stood on the ventilated floor with the crop in the back ground. The floor has perforated metal insets between the hard wood floor through which air blows to dry the seed after harvest.

The gantry which houses the enormous fan which blows the air through the system.

The air blows down this tunnel and in every bay that you can see is a vent which can be opened to allow airflow through and under the floor.

This is a massive financial investment and shows Hurrell's commitment to the seed industry, I was certainly very impressed.

Here's what happens when the fan is turned on like a snow storm.

I grow some seed trials for Hurrell's here are a couple of photos that my daughter Beverley took for me showing seed that was sown on the 1st October and taken on the 4th November grown outside these two samples were 34 days old.

The greener more vigorous one on the left is a mix of 50-50 Topgun and Colosseum both dwarf perennial rye grass with the one on the right being Carnac and Colosseum.

Watch out for Topgun its is an American cultivar with lots of advantages, that I am not going to bore you with now but I have all the history if you want details I have them all to hand so email me and I will let you have them.

You might think that this is an advert which it clearly is but I think it is important that you groundsmen know what is out there.

What else have I been up to?

 Ha yes I was asked to spike the square at Pudsey Congs main ground at Fullneck School home for the 3rd team I forgot to take photos at the main ground but here are a few from the School.
 You may remember I deep scarified this pitch -see post 25th September- and the grass cover is good for this Autumn when every one I have spoken to in this region has had poor germination.

Close up of the holes.

The other Bradford League Pudsey that is Pudsey St. Lawrence were concerned about poor germination they are on Surrey loam and it was so wet I was very late to get the seed in.
So I told them I would try germinate some seed and get that on. I returned on Monday this week and put it down. It was very hard to do as when I touched the loam to try get a bit of a seed bed it all just stuck to the folk or rake in a right mess so I put it down with a little loam on the top, best I could do and they were going to put the germ sheets back on over the ends only.

One of the three buckets of pre-germinated seed I put down.

 It rained as I was on with the job so I struggled to get a loam covering on all of it., ho yes I remember I also put some more seed down at the same time.

We have got some seed that has pushed it way through the cold wet Surrey loam as can be seen above.

It has two choices either it grows or it doesn't I have done my best.

Back on home ground and the leaves are a right mess so Tuesday I spent some time clearing them up.

Not rocket science but time consuming.

Still plenty to go at.

Because the grass is only just making an appearance the leaves are sticking to the wet loam so they have to be cleared away too.

Not done too bad.

Wednesday morning I was on one of my two visits to Headingley in two days  to have a look at the New pitch construction that was taking place I went with Keith Boyce and was shown round by head groundsman Jason Booth it is all very impressive I didn't take any photos but here is a link to Ryan's blog showing the construction stage by stage.
http://www.therhinos.co.uk/news/20754.php

Wednesday night I attended the IOG West Yorkshire Branch meeting at Cleckheaton Sports Club the speaker was Mark Waite of Playrite the artificial turf carpet manufacturer based just down the road from Cleckheaton. Very interesting talk and they have their uses but I feel a sadness inside every time grass is dug up and replaced with artificial, maybe I am just an old Romantic.
What is also note worthy is the attendance, which was a branch record of recent times 49 people showed up. Top effort by those who came, top effort by David and Rod who do the organising and top effort by Keith and John who sort out the catering. I don't know how they do it they never have a clue as to how many will turn up but they must have been well prepared because John was trying to give two loaves of bread away at the end of the night. Well done all concerned.

Thursday morning at 11-00am I was back at Headingley for an IOG
"North Region Steering Group Meeting" I left at 2-00 pm and it was just winding up.
Tomorrow Friday I am Hollow tining a Bowling green and as far forward as Wednesday the 21 st Nov I am giving a talk to the "Lincolnshire Cricket Groundsman's Association"
Not sure they know what they have let themselves in for.
 Need to prepare the power point presentation........ I am far better at cutting grass.
Catch you all soon.
Hodgy