Bowls Newsletter - 07/01/24
Happy New Year to you all. Welcome back for the second half of season 23/24. I hope that you enjoyed the time with family and friends and catching up on those chores that waited patiently.
Bowls commence on Wednesday with the Men’s teams. As we heard earlier from Greg, training resumes on Tuesday mornings. While on the topic of bowling our new pennant bowlers have certainly made a difference bringing refreshing enthusiasm and strength to our sides. The club has appreciated their flexibility with being available to fill in, sometimes at very short notice. I wish you all the best for the second half of the season. Onwards and upwards for the Kookaburras.
During the Christmas break Doug ran a successful casual competition over a couple of Saturdays. Unfortunately, yesterday was rained out so we watched the end of the Pink Test, which didn’t take long at all.
On behalf of the “Greens Team”, Ulli has prepared a detailed report regarding the artificial greens. I have included the report below and encourage you all to read and take note. Our new greens have been a wonderful investment making a tremendous difference. However, as with everything to ensure longevity maintenance and care are essential. To that end Ulli has asked that we use rinks other than what I am labelling as TV rinks (2, 3 and 4 on A green) and move to the outside rinks. Gone are the days of erratic bias and speed. Keep in mind that B green is running as well as A.
Mike is managing and overseeing line marking and has a core of volunteers who are regulars however would appreciate some more people offering to assist. He prefers to get out early in the morning to complete the task by 10am or so which means the greens can usually be open again later in the day. Please contact Mike to assist as many hands make light work.
Our greens have now been in use for over 12 month and performance feedback has been very positive. These surfaces require constant maintenance to ensure we can enjoy playing on them for a long time to come. Constant grooming like brushing, sweeping, watering, mould treatment and scarifying are only a few things to mention. Line marking is not lasting as we would like but we have now sourced a paint product that might give us a bit more life. Time will tell. Hopefully we can do the black lines again shortly.
Mike Lynch is the man in charge of line marking and he would appreciate your indication to help with this. It appears that we have always the same volunteers for this work of approx. 3 hours.
We would like to increase the speed of both Greens just a small fraction and hope to achieve this by a little bit more intense rolling. We must do this gradually as we don’t want Tranmere speeds for our greens. Therefore, please watch the maintenance board outside the clubhouse for notifications regarding this task. It might affect your bowling intentions, but we always leave one green available.
Today, Thursday 04 January we closed both Greens for scarifying. Scarifying is done with a special machine with a toothed roller set to a certain depth. The greens are worked two ways, east – west and north – south.
This process takes about 2hours per green and opens the surface which has been flattened due to bowls and foot traffic. With this process we also disturb the top layer of sand which holds down the green bowling surface. After treatment we apply water and spend about 1.5- 2 hours of intense rolling in both directions. This will help make the sand disappear deep into the “grass”. If you find some sand on your bowls in the next few days don’t be concerned. It will eventually disappear.
Picture below shows the surface after scarifying.
You can all help us by using the greens more evenly. Somehow everybody wants to play on rinks 2, 3 and 4 on A green. There is absolutely nothing wrong with rinks 1 or 7. They were horrible on our old green but are now equivalent to the rest of the playing field. We might have to close 2, 3 and 4 for a while for non-pennant use to help with more even wear.
Picture below shows a close up of the playing surface.
On behalf of the “Greens Team” I wish you all a great and successful second half of the season. If you have a bit of spare time available every now and then please talk to Peter, Mike of myself to make our volunteering a bit easier. There’s always something to do.
Cheers, Ulli and team
Invictus Australia
Friday January 19 from 5pm until 9.30pm. The event will be run by Bowls Australia however we would appreciate volunteers to assist with bar, bowling and BBQ.
Magill School Function
Thursday January 25 from 12pm until 5pm. Volunteers to assist with bowling please. This will need to be men as ladies are playing.
Mens Country Canival
Fours on Monday January 29 and Singles on Tuesday 30. Peter Glazbrook is event manager for both days and will be seeking volunteers for various tasks. See below for information from Peter.
You are probably aware that we are hosting events in late January.
Each day we need to cater for the start of day and a 2-course lunch. If you are able to assist in the kitchen, please advise Peter Glazbrook.
There will be a meeting at 11am on Tuesday January 16th to discuss menu and rostering.
We need an additional measurer for Monday if you can assist, please contact Jan Kruse. Tuesday January 30th, we need 12 markers for the day lunch will be provided.
On Tuesday there will be 3 sectional games plus 1 round of knockouts. For the knockouts we need 3 markers with a proposed finish time of approximately 6.30pm. If you are prepared for a late finish, please let me know.
Please note A and B green will be unavailable on these days. C green will be open on Tuesday and there are no pennant matches on Wednesday January 31st. Thursday pennant on February 1st will be held.
If you have any questions, please contact Peter Glazbrook events coordinator.
Regards Peter
A Day in the Gardens
Sunday March 3. The club’s Annual Open Tournament.
Please remember that when you visit one of our club sponsors to let them know you are from the KMBC so they know their sponsorship is worthwhile. Sponsors play a vital role in the future of our club so please be sure to support them whenever you can. Anyone who has an idea about a potential sponsor please approach anyone on the Committee to share your ideas.