benefits and challenges .
“ The first thing to know is that these are not ‘ no-maintenance ’ areas ,” said Skorulski . “ The level of maintenance depends on golfer expectations and the local environment . Golfers often envision naturalized areas being composed of thin , wispy turf that looks great and allows them to find their ball with relative ease . Achieving that in reality can require a lot of time and resources and it may be impossible at certain courses because of the soils , climate and vegetation . It ’ s also important to recognize that not all environments necessarily support an open grassland ; sometimes other native plants are a better choice .”
“ Even with a good management program , if naturalized areas are not carefully located , and if golfers are not well-informed about how they will perform , these areas can become a real headache .”
At Shinnecock Hills , managing 125 acres of native rough to a very high standard requires a lot of planning and hard work . “ The native areas at Shinnecock Hills are one of the defining features of the golf course ,” said Jon Jennings , superintendent since 2012 . “ We take a lot of pride in their appearance and in the environmental value they bring , but it takes a lot of work to maintain them .” “ Each spring , before the grasses start growing , we go through native areas and transplant any young trees we find to the perimeter of the property ,” says Jennings . “ This enhances screening and helps keep our open grassland from becoming a forest . We mow the native areas once in the spring to keep them from getting too tall during the season , then we mow them again starting in late fall . During the season , we mow native areas that come into play on an asneeded basis .” There are other benefits . At Todd Creek in Thornton , Colo ., superintendent Jeremy Casebolt converted 25 acres of mown rough to naturalized areas , reducing annual water use by more than 20 per cent . He then reached out to the USGA and using its Resource Management expanded the effort . “ We gave approximately 150 golfers GPS trackers to carry , then mapped where they had gone ,” said the USGA ’ s Larry Gilhuly . “ The GPS tracks allowed us to identify areas where little or no play was occurring . We targeted those locations for establishing naturalized areas .” As golf courses continue to expand their use of naturalized areas , the potential resource savings are significant . This can mean better overall playing conditions while helping golf facilities control costs and green fees . “ Golfers are generally very supportive of reducing the amount of maintained turf to conserve resources as long as the end result isn ’ t countless lost balls and pace of play grinding to a halt ,” says Gilhuly .
Unmowed areas at Shinnecock not only looked pretty , but provided environmental benefits , too .
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