Storms, droughts and mild winters

We spoke to three course managers representing a variety of course types from across the country and learned about the changes they are seeing as they go about their daily duties.

There’s no getting around it, it’s frustrating when the golf course is closed. For many of us it was something we had to get used to as the storms and seemingly never-ending rain that battered Great Britain & Ireland meant our layouts were sometimes shut for weeks at a time.

But as hard as it is for us to sit at home and hope the skies won’t open, our greenkeeping teams are at the sharp end dealing with the full force of winter’s wrath.

To give you a better insight into what they’ve been dealing with and how it affects their jobs, we assembled an experienced greenkeeping threeball.

The trio discuss the weather patterns they’ve seen, whether it’s going to get worse, and what golfers need to understand when the forecasts are foul.

What weather have you been seeing at your course?

Jez: In my relatively short time in greenkeeping, I’ve been through the Beast from the East, two severe droughts, the 46 inches of rain and then severe flooding of last year and then another extremely wet winter.

I don’t think I worked through a normal weather pattern, just a normal British summer that wasn’t extreme or a winter that’s not a white over or had dramatic rain figures.

Michael: Every year is different. The last 12 months have been extremely wet with constant heavy rain almost every other day.

February is traditionally one of our driest months, which is usually welcome after a wet winter and we often get a dry spring during the middle of March through April.

From Christmas until the start of spring, there is often not a lot we can do to keep the course open or closed. It’s down to the weather at that point.

That’s usually followed by a dry spell from the middle of March through until May, when we can go seven weeks with very little rain. However, the last 12 months have been very different and we’ve had constant rain since June 2023.

We got to October and November and the course was at saturation point. There was no room in the ground for any more rain. An additional 5 or 6mm of rain at that point would have closed the course and we stayed at that saturation point through until May.

Antony: I’ve been collecting data for the last six years at Romford and that’s shown me that extremes of weather are becoming more common. In 2022, we had three heatwaves within the space of 12 weeks – all touching 39 to 41 degrees over four or five days. Then you’ll get no rain for 60 days. We’re seeing more extreme weather and there doesn’t seem to be a pattern to it.

We’re so different in my area, Romford, compared to Birmingham – two hours up the road – where they’re probably getting twice our yearly rainfall. West Lancashire will be comfortably double what we are in the space of a year.

And it’s coming in big hits, which golf courses can’t cope with. They can’t cope with 30mm in a day, or even an inch in an hour, and that’s what we’re seeing a lot more. We’re not seeing the pattern where it rained for a day or two days and you got an inch. You could get that inch of rainfall in two hours and that causes more flooding, not only on the golf course but also in town centres and urban areas.

The data I’ve gathered has shown that the total amount of rainfall actually hasn’t increased and we continue to average 650mm a year. However, what has changed is that rather than being spread evenly throughout the year, we might get 100mm of rainfall in three or four days and then not a drop for a month. We can’t predict when this heavy rainfall events are going to happen, which makes it difficult to plan ahead.

How much have the weather patterns changed in the time you have been in the job?

Michael: What we are seeing is extremes. It’s hotter summers and wetter, milder winters. I’ve been a greenkeeper for 33 years and we used to get a lot of snow in September, October and around Christmas.

If you get two weeks of hard frost, that’s our winter these days. Last year, just before Christmas, we had a couple of weeks where it was -4 and -5 degrees Celcius for probably two weeks. But other than that, we’re just getting a little morning frost most of the time and we’re getting a whole lot more rain. When it’s frosty and cold, you don’t normally get rain because you’ve got clear skies. When it’s a bit milder, the clouds come across and it leads to constant rain.

How does that weather – whether it’s extreme rain or drought – impact on your jobs?

Antony: It impacts massively because there is no consistency and you’re not sure how to deal with it.

You don’t really know if you’re going to get a heatwave until seven days out and, even then, they’re still guessing. You can put some wetting agent down as preparation but that costs money and so you don’t want to waste that resource if you don’t have to.

You just have to prepare for the worst and get your processes in order. Hot weather does have its upsides, though. When it is hot and dry or there’s a drought, you aren’t using your cutting machines because growth slows, so you are saving money on fuel and maintenance costs. You find yourself doing other jobs that you might not expect to be doing in summer.

Jez: When I first went to Renishaw Park there were a lot of issues. We didn’t have an efficient irrigation system and we were losing gallons of water while switching it on. I wouldn’t even finish a programme before the water ran out.

Then we had the drought, where we had 40-odd degree heat, and we had no water to get out because of the leaks that had been left for years. The change in the weather would be so quick that the course would go from a boggy field where I couldn’t get machines out for fear of causing damage, to a dried, browned-off golf course that everybody wanted to play on.

Last winter, Renishaw closed for good and I went to The Grange, where they had experienced the most rainfall since records began. The greenkeepers hadn’t been able to get on their golf course for such a long time and in some places the grass was over ankle deep! Yet people still wanted to play golf.

The basics of greenkeeping on a parkland course are always determined by what is happening above and below you. Anything that’s even slightly out of the ordinary immediately puts you on the back foot because you try to protect what you’ve got and you have to be delicate so as not to cause further damage.

Michael: The weather can impact a golf course and how a greenkeeping team works. During droughts, we need to keep the grass alive by using irrigation systems and some wetting agents.

We put wetting agents down on greens and tees and that helps to spread the water evenly and stops dry patch. We have irrigation on greens and tees and, if it’s extreme drought, we will stop cutting grass as that helps protect the golf course.

We’d back off a little bit during those periods by not cutting quite as frequently and lifting heights of cut. That helps us avoid stressing the grasses out more than they already are.

We can still do minor tasks to keep the course manicured, but at times like those it is important to back off and give the course chance to breathe.

Can you predict what the weather might do?

Antony: Even with the weather apps, you just don’t know what’s going to happen.

Only a few days ago, they said no rain. I was on my way home and it was dangerous driving due to really heavy rainfall. Places were saying they were getting washed out. Around the M25 line, the Addington, West Surrey, Tandridge, they were recording 45mm in a couple of hours. Get to Romford, five or six miles across the bridge, and they’ve got nothing. That’s a perfect example of extreme rainfall and how it can be concentrated in isolated areas. When you get 45mm of rain in a couple of hours all your bunkers are going to be washed out, which means your plans for the week ahead are suddenly out of the window.

Will it get worse in the future?

Jez: I’m going 60/40 that it might be extreme more often but, having read and listened to those people believed to be experts in what happens in climate change, the planet is doing what the planet needs to do. I think there must be an element of everything comes in cycles. This year, we’ve had a few warmish days, but it’s been a kind of normal summer. They predicted 50 or 60 days of full rain in the summer and we’ve not had that. Who’s to say this winter is just going to be mild and relatively wet, but not 46 inches by the end of October?

I don’t think we’re able to predict what the planet does. I think we’re going to live by it and see what we get but, hopefully, people are more prepared because they’ve lived through the previous extremes. So you’ve got some prior knowledge and prior planning. You think, ‘this might happen so let’s make sure that’s working’.

Michael: I think it will continue. Global warming is definitely happening. Some people still think this is just a warm spell and climate change isn’t real, but all you’ve got to do is turn on the news and see the floods in India or the wildfires in Australia and California. People are dying as a result of climate change, whether through flash flooding or poverty caused by crop failure. When you put it in that context, our troubles on the golf course are very minor.

Antony: You’ll see it steadily get more and more extreme. I think you’ll have a massive north/south divide. From what I see with weather patterns, you can draw a line from the Severn Bridge straight across to The Wash in North Norfolk. Anything south of that is going to be warm and anything else is going to be a lot cooler and wetter.

Do golfers need to alter their expectations?

Jez: I’m a low-single-figures golfer and I think they are becoming a little bit more sensible. The channels where greenkeepers are posting videos or images on social media and the information that is coming out from greens departments to members is more than it has ever been. And those messages are passed across to them more often than ever and the information on hand is a lot easier [to obtain]. You see members posting things themselves – ‘this relates to my golf course, this is what’s happening, we’re not the only ones’. I think golfers are changing.

Antony: It’s hard to put this - I think some golfers aren’t too bothered how you get there as long as you get there. They’re not that bothered if you’re struggling – ‘I pay my subs. I want it like this’. You will get through to some, though.

Greenkeepers are getting more educated – with technology, machinery, irrigation systems, wetting agents, new ways of draining our areas – we’re adapting ourselves with technology a lot quicker than most other sports.

Even if the climate does get more extreme, greenkeepers will navigate our way through it. Sometimes you have to take a step back and realise there’s only so much you can achieve.

At that point mental health needs come into play and golfers and committees must realise their responsibility with regards to not putting too much pressure on their course manager, who isn’t able to control the weather.

Likewise, if you aren’t willing to invest in resources, you need to limit your expectations.

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This article was first published in Your Course, the twice-yearly publication from the British and International Golf Greenkeepers Association. Your Course invites golfers to gain a deeper appreciation of what preparing and maintaining a golf course really involves. Head to www.bigga.org.uk to find out more.