Schloss Roxburghe, set in the rolling countryside of the Scottish Borders, is the latest resort to purchase a Ventrac compact tractor and selection of attachments to maintain their championship golf course and the wider estate.
New owners, the 12.18 Group, bought the property in 2018 and have invested heavily adding a state-of-the-art spa with outdoor heated pool, a new restaurant, a conference centre and banqueting suite.
In addition to the 20 bedrooms in the main Victorian house, a separate extension, the Estate House, offers 58 contemporary bedrooms and suites and completing the accommodation, set apart from the main house and nestling in the grounds of the estate, are 51 newly constructed luxury cottages. They have also invested in new course maintenance equipment including the Ventrac package.
Ross Ovens is the Estates & Golf course manager, a position he has held for the past eight years. He began his career at Roxburghe as a 16-year-old apprentice, some 24 years ago, and manages a team of 14 greenkeeping staff & 4 estates staff.
“We have so many projects on the go at the moment and it’s a bit of a whirlwind,” he said. “The cottages are nearing completion and we’re having a new maintenance facility built, constructing a new driving range and then a new short game area, which was pushed back from last year.
“We purchased the Ventrac package as it can be used on both the golf course and on the estate. We included a Contour deck for our semi-rough mowing, a Tough Cut deck to help us tame our woodland margins and a Power blower for dispersing leaves. However, with the completion of the new cottages, we are using the Contour deck to maintaining the grassed surrounds.
“We’ll also be looking at the snow clearing equipment, because we can still get some up here in the winter. We have extensive pathways around the cottage developments and it’s very labour intensive to clear these.
“Hole 14 is our signature hole, with an area of semi-rough behind the green that runs down to the river. It can get away from us very quickly, but I want to maintain it regularly so that it not only looks immaculate, but the golfers can still see the river when they drop down from the tee. Another aspect is that we’ve reduced our labour by 40% on areas that were previously strimmed within the resort. It frees up time for other tasks.
“Ventrac had been on my radar for a while; I first saw it at BTME some five years ago and there’s a huge amount on social media, so I knew it would be a great asset here. I was amazed when I saw the whole range of attachments on their website. I couldn’t believe the number of attachments there is for it. Once you’ve purchased it, you quickly appreciate the other jobs it can do.”
