Can a classic renovation be just cleaning & clearing?

[Joel_Stewart]

Yesterday I had an email regarding the other thread "a good read" which discusses Shinnecock and the superintendents efforts over the last few years.   Furthermore I was detailing how my course has recently cleared a few hundred trees and has opened up the views, playing angles and as a result turf conditions have improved etc, etc.

This person mentioned that cleaning and clearing is not renovation.  It really knocked me over since it has changed the way my course plays but he is right since nothing has been done to restore lost bunkers or anything else the original architect had entailed.

Is tree clearing just a prelude to renovation?

[tonyt]

If a wide open golf course gets gradually grown over in places with trees, and the architecture itself has not otherwise been changed at all, then clearing of the growth since opening will in fact be a restoration will it not?

I think a heck of a lot of golf holes that have timber and selected other vegetation removed will then look and play a lot closer to what they did in yesteryears.

[Joe Hancock]

Joel,

I would think tree clearing would be considered housekeeping. As unglamorous a term that is, I think it could be the most important element of a restoration program at some courses. The benefits of tree clearing shouldn't be diminished.

Joe

[Patrick_Mucci]

Joel,

Are you sure you don't mean "restoration" , not renovation ?

[RDecker]

To me renovation would imply the moving of at least some earth and the changing of some playing surface dimesions or shapes.  Clearing and cleaning lends itself to the restoration side of things doesn't it?