OAKLEY IS A HIVE OF ACTIVITY

Oakley Bowling Club has been a hive of activity over the last few weeks. With no play having taken place this summer, the recent good weather has been the ideal opportunity for the Club to carry out greens refurbishment work which would normally be conducted towards the end of September and to carry out tasks designed to enhance our existing facilities. More than 20 members, socially distanced of course, have been involved in the various projects, which have seen the exterior of the pavilion completely re-stained, the leylandi hedges alongside the green severely cut back and a huge amount of work on the green itself. This began with hollow coring (and the removal of all the cores) and solid tining, after which some 350 bags of top dressing was manually barrelled onto the green and carefully spread under the watchful eye of our Greens Co-ordinator Ian Rickman. Today, almost the last of the heavy work on the green itself was completed when the green was drag matted several times. Tomorrow fertiliser will be applied. By early next week the Autumn work on the green will have been completed and whilst routine maintenance will continue throughout the winter, hopefully, we have ensured that the green will be in excellent condition when next year we enthusiastically resume bowling. The Committee is enormously grateful to all those members who give up their time to work at the green, not only now but throughout the year, and to those who have kept them fed and watered. Without these splendid volunteers, and all the other members who help in different ways, the costs of running the Club would be very substantially higher.