We all know about the gorse on the west coast. Is there any left on the east coast?
This is from a 1925 USGA article.
Gorse, or whin, and Scotch broom are two shrubby plants that
are common on golf courses in Britain. Everyone who has been to
St. Andrews is familiar with the thickets of gorse, a spiny shrub
which lines many of the fairways, and bearing a profusion of beau-
tiful yellow flowers when in bloom. Scotch broom is very similar,
but is not spiny. Both of these shrubs are introduced in America.
Gorse and broom are common shrubs on the northwest Pacific coast
from Vancouver Island to southern Oregon. Gorse occurs in the
same area and also on the Atlantic coast from the vicinity of Nan-
tucket Island southward to Virginia. Scotch broom is introduced
abundantly in Virginia and Massachusetts, and also occurs in Nova
Scotia. In these two regions a few golf courses have one or both
of these shrubs on the golf courses. The suggestion has often been
made that they are very desirable for this purpose, giving, as it were,
a sort of Scotch atmosphere to the golf course. Plants of Scotch
broom can be secured from various nurserymen, but none of them
seem to advertise gorse plants, although seed of this is available.
Recently Mr. Bartlett Arkell, of Canajoharie, N. Y., has become
interested in this subject, with the view to testing it out on the
Ekwanok course at Manchester, Vt. There is some serious doubt
whether either gorse or broom will survive the severe winters of
that region; at least neither of them seems to have spread that far
north. However, in the regions where these shrubs do survive the
winter it is well worth while for any golf course to consider the
planting of these at different places, both for their ornamental value
and for the sentiment connected with them.