I think he’d prefer the bougieness of old school fox hunting on horseback with hounds.
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Yet another honorable activity librooools have ruined for the rational people of the world.
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laughing real hard
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Block list is where the real party is.
is TC on this list too? Would pay a lot to be the 4th in that tee time.
Either I’m not remembering the specifics and I changed it from frog to snail, or the guy had the details wrong. I haven’t read up on the issue considering I live 3,500 miles from there. But I think whether its snakes or snails or even a Cockamouse (shout out How I Met Your Mother fans) it was not a valid reason to block it.
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Great article in the Melbourne paper today describing efforts with the remnant native flora at Royal Melbourne.
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Sometimes he replicates them in entirely new spots by removing areas of pristine lawn and planting heathland shrubs, grasses and wildflowers instead.
This sentence gave my heart so much joy.
If the golf course wasn’t here, we would be standing in backyards.
This is an incredibly viable environmental argument—especially in the US given the American obsession with lawns—that only works if the golf course isn’t just 500 acres of grass and trees. Municipal courses (and all courses within city limits) need to be areas of regional environmental diversity, not vast swaths of monoculture.
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good Fried Egg podcast on this issue out yesterday with guest Cole Thompson from the USGA on their efforts to study environmental impacts of golf and ways to improve sustainability.
I’m on a green committee at a club that is looking at a full course renovation, and there are things mentioned in this podcast I will push for as a part of that effort. We have a big property, and things like including more native areas, with attention paid to what grasses are native to this area (rather than any old tall grass) and would provide habitat for local wildlife. There was also discussion about working with the audubon society to restore milkweed plants throughout the central US to support the struggling monarch during their migrations from Canada to Mexico.
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My mother-in-law recently redid her entire garden to natives and milkweed to support the “pollinator chain.” Trying to see what we can do for our place as well. Took down a tree and have a large empty mulch section right now, could do something there for sure.
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Built my wife a number of garden beds for her vegetable garden this summer. Did some research and apparently planting milkweed near cucumbers helps bolster your yield as it attracts pollinators to the area in addition to butterflies and bees. Essentially a win win for veggie production and helping the struggling butterflies/bees.
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look past the typical attention-grabbing headline and read on to better understand how the public views the game. I learned a few things from this article and was worth the 5min.
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Really interesting read. You have to think it’s only a matter of time before courses everywhere have to start to adapt to survive - both environmentally and in the eyes of the public
Here’s a thought that could help courses deal with increases energy costs, increasing labor costs, labor shortages, and save money into the future that I proposed and was well received by our superintendent.
- switch to the electric/robotic green mowers
- install solar on top of maintenance buildings
I understand that these robotic mowers still need to be shuttled around by a human on likely a gas powered cart. But there’s a skill in mowing a green, and I’m guessing staff can be trained quickly on the robotics. In our area, the electric provider allows you to opt into a program that provides cheaper rates during off-peak times if you reduce your consumption during peak times. A solar installation seems perfect for this.
even without the electric mowers, it just seems like there’s a big opportunity in golf to start adding solar on top of maintenance buildings and flip the narrative. Golf courses becoming a carbon sink and clean energy producer is a WAY different narrative than is being told now.
And goodness how much better of a golf experience would it be if all the maintenance vehicles switched to silent electric power?
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The article does its best to cover so much ground, but doesn’t go beyond skin deep on any issue and therefore can’t reach any conclusion.
Royal Melbourne sits on perhaps the most perfect soil; conducive to bouncy conditions, holding sufficient water for growth, but never too much to be soft and encourage weed ingress. Go ahead and recreate that year round on a heavy soil in Michigan or Georgia.
Golf courses built on appropriate land (coastal linksland - traditionally unsuitable for farming, Melbourne Sandbelt etc) will always be the most sustainable. Similarly those in climates where plant growth (and thus fertiliser inputs) are lowest will be the most kind to the planet.
Building courses in tropical climates (high fertiliser and chemical inputs) or in Saudi fucking Arabia/Dubai etc etc are environmental disasters from the start. More water and fertiliser require more maintenance machinery, staff and cost.
Environmental programs are all well and good but are mostly used for resume padding rather than to make a genuine difference. Ultimately your best environmental policy should be to do less - Fewer inputs, fewer machines, more minimal maintenance. Robotics, Solar Panels all sound great but are additional costs and offset environmental damage to other parts of the world (cobalt mining etc).
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I’m wondering if we can get some further thoughts on this from the NLU boys after last night’s TS episode. I think I remember @djpie saying something along the lines of “they water the greens and the tees, and everything in between just plays as it is, and if more people would just be cool with that we could do it all the time.”
I currently work at a course that occupies around 175 acres, and I’m not kidding you, every square inch of that place gets touched by a sprinkler. They’ve had to dig an enormous new retention pond, deepen another one by 300% and put in thousands of feet of new irrigation in just the past couple of years, and in conversation with the assistant pro recently I was told “water isn’t an issue out here.” I can’t even begin to express how much that grinds my gears.
As expressed in yesterday’s video, Wawashkamo isn’t on the greatest golfing soil. It’s not the sandbelt or coastal linksland. But, from the looks of the video, it’s in great condition and a joy to play. Why can’t more courses adopt this?
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I agree with pretty much everything here.
I totally recognize that the production of panels, batteries, and most everything takes place under less environmentally friendly circumstances than I would like. I have not yet made the leap to say that these programs are not worth pursuing as a result. I haven’t seen the carbon accounting on that.
Basically, it’s hard for me, as a committee member to sell returning 10acres of land back to native to reduce our inputs. It’s more abstract/indirect than to suggest we put some panels on a building tucked in the corner and drop our electric bill by $5,000/yr.
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we’re not that big, I think I’ve heard we have 75acres of maintained rough and another 25 acres of tees and fairways, plus a few more for greens. I’m trying to reduce it by 10% and haven’t been able to get the program off the ground.
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The irrigation sales pitch that says ‘more heads = better control, so you actually use less water’ makes my eyes roll back into my skull.
In regards to Wawashkamo, with all the best of intentions, NLU couldn’t have played it at a better time of year. Busier, conventional 18 holers with different grasses, more extreme weather etc may not fare so kindly.
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Very interesting and worthwhile topic, but honestly I can’t get past ED. Newbie who has heard him mentioned on some of the older Nest pods, but this is the first thread I’ve actually seen him in action. It got to “heliskiing is the only solace” so fast. I’ll need days to process that.
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