CHAPTER IISOME FURTHER SUGGESTIONS

It cannot be too frequently emphasised that in starting a new course or reconstructing an old one it is of the utmost importance that the committee should have a scheme before them of a definite and final nature. It would be sound finance for the majority of golf clubs to pay the expenses of the Green Committee for the purpose of visiting good examples of construction work on other courses.

They should not of necessity visit courses where the leading open competitions are held, as many of the very best clubs rarely offer their courses for competitions.

They should be guided in their choice of architect by a course constructed out of indifferent material, and not by oneconstructed out of magnificent natural golfing land.

They should take into consideration the cost, the popularity with all classes of players, and the finality and permanency of the work.

Having decided on the architect and having passed the plan, it is as well to take steps to ensure that the construction work is done according to the ideas of the designer.

Experience of advising a hundred golf clubs has convinced the writer that the work can never be done properly except under occasional expert supervision. Work done without expert supervision is invariably bad.

The designer should not be tied down too closely to his original plan. Mature consideration and unexpected changes in the subsoil, etc., may make a modification in the plan necessary to save expense and get better results.

In a small book of this kind, it is impossible to go into the thousand and one details which make for economy in course construction, but some of these may be enumerated.

The chief items in the construction of a golf course are the following:

The cost of carting can often be reduced to a minimum by using a little thought in the work. The stone from stone walls, rocks, the turf from turf walls, or soil taken out of excavations should never be carted away: they can always be used for raising a neighbouring green inthe form of a plateau, or in making hummocks or large undulations indistinguishable from the natural ones which are so delightful on seaside courses. It is rarely necessary to cart soil from a distance for the purpose of making a hummock or a green. It is much more economical to remove a sufficient area of turf from and around the site of an intended hummock or green, and utilise the soil removed from the area around the hummock for this purpose. This is a double advantage. The surrounding ground is lowered as the hummock is raised, and makes the hummock appear higher, and at the same time it is made to merge imperceptibly into the surrounding hollow or hollows, and has a much more natural appearance. A hollow removed from the front of the green has the effect of making the green appear as if it were raised upon a plateau, and this is still further accentuated if the soilremoved is also used to build up the green.

Similarly the green and the bunkers guarding it should all be made at the same time; the soil moved in making the bunkers can then be utilised in the formation of the green. It was in former years considered imprudent to construct bunkers until the experience of playing revealed the proper position, but since those days our knowledge of green-keeping has advanced. An expert can judge by the character of the grasses and the nature of the undulations the amount of run which the ball is likely to get, and this knowledge, combined with actual measurements, gives more information than it is possible to gain by playing. Perhaps the most important reason why the architect’s scheme should be completed in the first instance is that bunkers are hardly ever placed in the right position afterwards. It is difficult to find a memberof a Green Committee who is not subconsciously prejudiced against placing a bunker where he is likely to get trapped himself.

After carting there is usually a considerable amount of labour necessary to obliterate the tracks. Carting should, when possible, be done when the ground is hard, in dry weather or during frost. Carts should not be allowed to wander about all over the place, but should be made to keep in one track. It is often advisable to remove the turf previous to carting and relay it after the carting is finished. Carts can sometimes be replaced with advantage by sledges with flat-bottomed runners.

By introducing labour-saving machinery we have recently been getting better results at less than pre-war cost. If work on a large scale is being done, the steam navvyor grab might be tried for excavating and making hummocks, etc.; traction engines are useful in uprooting small trees, and larger ones can with advantage be blown up by dynamite. I recently used blasting charges for the purpose of assisting to make bunkers. An article in one of the Sheffield papers somewhat humorously stated that this was not the first occasion Dr. Mackenzie’s bunkers had been “blasted.”

The “Scraper” at work on Wheatley Park course, Doncaster.

Trolleys on rails are frequently used to save carting or wheeling barrows.

The two machines which are found of the greatest value in saving labour are the turf-cutting machine and the American scraper or scoop—the former made from designs by the writer. It will cut an acre of sods in an afternoon, and, moreover, cuts them of a more even thickness than by hand. This machine is worked by two horses like a plough. One or two clubs have condemned it withouta fair trial, and on inquiry I have usually found that the weather was too dry, the grass too long, the blades had not been set properly, or that it had been used by a man who had had no previous experience in working one. It has been used by scores of clubs with a great deal of success. At Moortown we sodded over twenty acres of sour heath land with it. The cost of this amounted to little compared with sowing, as we were able to remove the sods from a neighbouring field. Sowing would have cost at least twice as much, as there were no signs of even a blade of grass on most of the land, and no sowing was likely to be successful without lime and manuring, and carting a tremendous quantity of soil so as to form a seed bed. The results have been infinitely better and quicker than sowing at the rate of even twelve bushels of the best grass seeds to the acre.

Grange-over-Sands: the turf-cutting machine at work. The photograph shows the dead, flat, featureless character of the country before the work began.

Grange-over-Sands: sandhills constructed by means of the scraper on terrain originally perfectly flat.

The scraper is worked by a horse or twohorses, and is particularly useful for excavating light soil, but can even be used on heavy land if each layer is ploughed before the scraper is used. The scraper is shaped like a large shovel, the handles are raised, and the horse pulls and it digs into the ground until it is full; the handles are then depressed and the horse pulls it along to the required situation; it is then tipped up, and the horse returns for another load. One horse and two men by this means can do the work of a score of men working in the ordinary way with wheelbarrows. In making hollows and hummocks it has an additional advantage in that it gives them automatically a natural appearance, and at the same time the horse in climbing up to the top of the hump compresses the soil, and it does not sink so much afterwards.

The scraper has been used with considerable success at Castletown (Isle ofMan), Wheatley Park (Doncaster), and Grange-over-Sands, among other courses.

It is important in constructing a new or altering an old course to get the work done as quickly as possible: if the work is done gradually the sods lie about for some time and are sometimes ruined. Most of the work should be done during October and November, before the frosts commence: good methods of organisation should prevent men being unemployed during frost. If the greens, drains, and sites of bunkers are previously pared, and the sods allowed to lie, then even though frost sets in, the sods may be removed and a certain amount of excavation can still be proceeded with. Sand, soil, and manures may be carted, hedges stubbed up, and trees removed during frost.

It is advisable to drain golfing land much more thoroughly and efficientlythan ordinary farm land, but, on the other hand, by exercising a little thought it can be done much more cheaply. For the purpose of golf it is not only unnecessary to drain as deeply as is customary for agricultural purposes, but it is much cheaper and more satisfactory to adopt a system of shallow drains.

On a golf course, there is never any necessity to make allowance for the possibility of subsoil ploughing; the drains can therefore be kept near the surface. The great thing to bear in mind in draining is that the water stratum must be tapped. On heavy clay land, it is absurd to put drains in the middle of the clay, unless the whole of the trench is filled with clinkers or other porous material, and this is needlessly expensive. Drains may at times be placed in a groove on the surface of the clay. On land of this description drains may often be placed with advantage at as shallow a depth as from6 to 12 inches. It should be unnecessary to state that no effort should be spared to see that there is sufficient fall, and for the purpose of ensuring this it is often necessary to take the levels. Sufficient thought is rarely given to drainage. The site of the main drains and the whole scheme of drainage should be very carefully studied, and it is of special importance to take into consideration the nature of the subsoil and position of the water level. In peat, on the other hand, it is frequently advisable to drain below the peat, even if this extends to a depth of 6 feet or more. If this is impossible owing to lack of sufficient fall, wooden boards should be placed below the drains.

The cheapest method of draining is by a system of mole drainage. I have frequently used a mole drain worked by horses which was made from suggestions by Franks, the Moortown green-keeper, and myself. It is used as an attachmentto the turf-cutting machine. By this method golf courses on clay land could be drained, previous to the war, at less than a pound per acre.

This mole drain works at the shallow depth of 6 inches, and is not applicable to agricultural land, as even horses galloping over the ground are sufficient to block the channel. It is, moreover, wonderfully satisfactory on golfing land, especially as supplementary to ordinary tile draining. Whenever the ground is sticky, or any casual water appears, the mole is run through and it becomes absolutely dry at once. This mole drain has a big advantage over the larger one, in that the cut made by the mole is so small that it does not interfere with the lie of the ball.

We have recently used a tractor instead of horses to pull the mole, and have found it a great advantage to do so. The use of the mole provides a solutionfor the problem of converting the muddiest of clay London courses into good winter links. Experience has proved that the effect lasts for fully ten years.

One of the most remarkable results of its use is that it gets rid of worms. This is probably owing to the fact that it makes the ground so dry that the worms can’t work in it.

It also prevents the ground becoming baked during dry summer weather. This is a well-known effect of good drainage, although possibly an unexpected one to the uninitiated. It is largely due to the drainage preventing the ground becoming caked, and also to the encouragement of turf with a good bottom to it.

The cheapest and best method of removing turf is by means of a turf-cutting machine. The thickness of the turf should vary according to the nature of thegrasses and the character of the subsoil. As a general rule, turf for greens should be cut as thin as 1½ inches. This is particularly important if the turf contains many tap-rooted weeds; the roots of the weeds and many of the coarser grasses are then left behind in the cutting.

In the experience of the writer, it is frequently not a difficult matter to get excellent turf in the immediate neighbourhood of a golf course at an extremely cheap rate—a halfpenny a yard or under—and turf obtained from the immediate neighbourhood of the course is much more likely to be suitable than turf obtained elsewhere. The writer has known a golf club going to the expense of getting Silloth turf at 9d.a yard, the grasses of which would inevitably disappear and be replaced by those of its environment within a year or two, when much more suitable turf could be obtained from the next field at a cost of a farthing a yard.It should be borne in mind that the most useless turf from a farming point of view is frequently the most valuable for golf. There are many other details which help to lessen the cost of turfing. In an old-established course, turf for new greens or for renovating old ones can frequently be obtained from the sides of a neighbouring fairway, the sods from which may be replaced by those removed from the site of the green.

There is usually a well-trodden path extending from every tee to the nearest fairway. There is no turf so useful for renovating an old or making a new tee as that obtained from a firm path of this kind. The sods removed should be replaced by others, and they in turn get hard and firm.

An important question is the use of manures in turfing. Stable or farmyard manure should almost invariably be placed under the sods: the amount should vary according to the turf and soil. Five loadsper green is an average, and on undulating greens the manure should be placed under the raised portions only. The hollows will look after themselves. Manure does more harm than good if dug deeply in: it should be forked in immediately under the sods, and the roots of the finer grasses feed on it at once. If dug in deeply, the coarser grasses are encouraged at the expense of the finer.

On wormy inland courses considerable expense in worm-killers can frequently be saved by placing a few loads of coke breeze under the sods.

Although the best time to turf is in the late autumn and winter months, sods can, if necessity arises, be laid in certain localities as late as June.

If hot dry weather arrives, the newly laid sods should be covered with cut grass during the day, and in the evening the grass should be removed so that the dews help to keep the ground moist.

The writer has known of several instances where ground has been sown, and the result has been so unsatisfactory that after a year or two the land had to be ploughed up and resown.

It is much more economical in the long run to do the thing thoroughly. Mistakes are most frequently made in sowing with the wrong seeds—in not preparing the ground thoroughly beforehand, and in sowing at the wrong time of year.

It is most important that a mixture should be chosen containing a goodly proportion of seeds corresponding to the prevailing grasses of the immediate neighbourhood, and seeds should always be obtained from a seeds merchant who is not afraid of telling you the exact composition of his mixture. Some seeds merchants sell mixtures which are not so valuable for golfing turf as they appear—it is notthe best kind of grass which germinates too quickly. Finer turf usually results from a mixture which comes up more slowly but is of a more permanent character. If seeding is necessary, it is frequently advisable to sow with much larger quantity of seed than is customary.

It is of the utmost importance to prepare the land thoroughly before sowing. The ground should be well drained, the land well limed when necessary, and fifteen loads to the acre of well-rotted stable manure incorporated with the soil or a mixture of artificial manure in its stead.

After sowing see that the birds are scared away by one of the numerous devices suggested for the purpose.

It is surprising how much money can be saved in manures by the help of science and a sufficient knowledge of chemistryto enable you to judge which are the cheapest and most valuable manures suitable for the soil of the locality with which you have to deal.

It is often advisable to make a point of studying the by-products of the different industries in the district, as it is obvious that if a suitable manure for the soil can be obtained on the spot, it is obtained cheaper than by rail or cart from a distance. Fish or meat guano, basic slag, malt dust, sulphate of ammonia, chalk, the refuse from leather, cloth, and shoddy factories, seed crushing mills, seaweed, manure extracted from town sewage works, peat moss litter, etc., are all of value under different circumstances.

Basic slag can sometimes be obtained from a neighbouring steel works, sulphate of ammonia from a gas works, chalk from a neighbouring chalk pit, or seaweed from the seashore. Manures should be used with a considerable amountof discretion and only in small quantities at a time. I have known a considerable amount of damage done by the unintelligent use of artificials. For example, artificials are of the greatest possible value for golfing turf, but they should always be used in small quantities but frequently, and should be well diluted with soil or sand, and only used during moist weather. A mixture, consisting of superphosphate of lime, sulphate of ammonia, and sulphate of potash, supplies most of the feeding material that is necessary for golf, and the experiments at Rothamstead conclusively prove that the character of the grasses can be completely altered by varying the proportion of the different constituents of this mixture.

Sulphate of ammonia is the most valuable of the constituents of this mixture, but I have known of several greens (including even St. Andrews) temporarilyruined by using sulphate of ammonia injudiciously. It should never be put on a green undiluted, as, like most artificials, it has a great affinity for water, and in dry weather absorbs the water from the grasses and burns them up. It also should never be used if the land is the least bit sour, as it simply increases this sourness.

A green-keeper should attempt to get a sufficient knowledge of botany and chemistry to know by the character of the herbage of his greens the kind and the amount of manure that is required. Green-keepers sometimes think that if they use twice the usual quantity of a manure, it will have double the effect; the exact contrary is the case, as the green may be ruined entirely.

The most important manure of all is cut grass. If the cut grass is always left on the greens and fairways, very little manuring is necessary. On the otherhand, if the grass is constantly removed year after year (unless a considerable amount of manure is added to take its place), the turf becomes impoverished and full of weeds. One of the unexpected results of leaving the grass on is that less mowing is necessary. This is probably due to the fact that the growth goes into the roots and not into the leaves. Mowing without the box on is of special importance on sandy or seaside courses.

Sand is often an expensive item on an inland course. It is surprising how frequently a good class of sand is found in pockets on a course or in the immediate neighbourhood. A knowledge of geology and botany will enable you to foretell where sand is likely to be found.

On several occasions on visiting a course I have been told that there was no sand in the district, and have been able tofind some by noting the character of the trees, grasses, etc. Sand may be economised by the method in which bunkers are made. It will be noticed in the photographs reproduced that most of the hollows have been turfed, but have been formed in such a way that a ball gravitates towards the sand, which is thrown up against the face. Bunkers of this description have a much more natural appearance, and the amount of sand needed is also considerably less than usual.

A bunker on the Fulford course, artificially constructed on flat land at a cost of £3.

By far the most important of all the foregoing suggestions is the ultimate economy of making it as reasonably certain as possible that any work done is of a permanent character and has not ultimately to be done over again. There are few committees of golf clubs who attach sufficient importance to expert advice. I suppose this is partly due to the fact that they themselves would sooner have the work done badly and have thefun of doing it than see any one else do it for them. In the nature of things a course can only be constructed by an individual: “Too many cooks spoil the broth” is a proverb which is more applicable in the case of golf courses than in anything else.

I personally am a strong believer in encouraging the individuality of the green-keeper, and not interfering with, but rather encouraging, his original ideas, unless they are in opposition to sound fundamental principles.

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