Yesterday I joined our wood burning team, a bunch of volunteers mainly made up by a couple of directors, the treasurer, the club captain and a couple of match & comps officials, I think I was possibly 1 of only 3 'normal' playing members, there were 10 of us in total!
The club constantly asks for volunteers to help in some areas and with all the storm damage the course has been peppered with debris from the vast amount of trees we have all over course. Armed with a rake we collected everything from small broken twig like branches to full sized 10" diameter 20ft long branches and piled them up within the tree plantations between the fairways and burnt them. We managed to rake an area within the plantations that split the 1st & 6th, the 6th & 5th and the 5th & 3rd fairways around 120yds in length with each plantation being about 25/30 yards wide and going across all those fairways.
A solid 2.5hrs of raking and building 8 large bonfires was the most work I had done for some time but when I looked back and walked across those plantations back to the clubhouse, the difference was remarkable and something our team of only 5/6 green staff could not have kept up with, especially when you think that this constant destruction from high winds and storms is right across acres of land across our course.
I have been critical at times of our greens staff, I play quite a bit or practice at the club up to 3 times mid-week and I can go days without seeing any of them, however, with 10 of us working on just that small area, it opened my eyes slightly of what they are up against and how hard it must be to prioritise the work required to keep us all playing.
I follow quite a few greens staff at clubs on Twitter and I see a lot of what some clubs accomplish, however, some of those very established clubs have a very large workforce and the funds to throw at those jobs, I'd think most of our clubs don't!
So, I will be volunteering now more often and I will put people right when I am playing with some of the habitual moaners of our course as I witnessed what it took 10 of us to do yesterday never mind the endless list of other duties they have to do to keep us all playing on our courses.
Do you or have you considered volunteering on any such work programmes at your club, or do you think, I've paid my subs its their responsibility?
I've seen the light
The club constantly asks for volunteers to help in some areas and with all the storm damage the course has been peppered with debris from the vast amount of trees we have all over course. Armed with a rake we collected everything from small broken twig like branches to full sized 10" diameter 20ft long branches and piled them up within the tree plantations between the fairways and burnt them. We managed to rake an area within the plantations that split the 1st & 6th, the 6th & 5th and the 5th & 3rd fairways around 120yds in length with each plantation being about 25/30 yards wide and going across all those fairways.
A solid 2.5hrs of raking and building 8 large bonfires was the most work I had done for some time but when I looked back and walked across those plantations back to the clubhouse, the difference was remarkable and something our team of only 5/6 green staff could not have kept up with, especially when you think that this constant destruction from high winds and storms is right across acres of land across our course.
I have been critical at times of our greens staff, I play quite a bit or practice at the club up to 3 times mid-week and I can go days without seeing any of them, however, with 10 of us working on just that small area, it opened my eyes slightly of what they are up against and how hard it must be to prioritise the work required to keep us all playing.
I follow quite a few greens staff at clubs on Twitter and I see a lot of what some clubs accomplish, however, some of those very established clubs have a very large workforce and the funds to throw at those jobs, I'd think most of our clubs don't!
So, I will be volunteering now more often and I will put people right when I am playing with some of the habitual moaners of our course as I witnessed what it took 10 of us to do yesterday never mind the endless list of other duties they have to do to keep us all playing on our courses.
Do you or have you considered volunteering on any such work programmes at your club, or do you think, I've paid my subs its their responsibility?
I've seen the light
