[Jim_Kennedy]

Indigenous golf has worked for centuries, the new question is can you sell it today.

[Sean_A]

Jim

I think we know it can be sold to folks who don't want to blow loads of dough on a game.  Are you asking will people forego their country club conditions to slum it on a permanent basis? 

Ciao

[Mike_Young]

Jim

I think we know it can be sold to folks who don't want to blow loads of dough on a game.  Are you asking will people forego their country club conditions to slum it on a permanent basis? 

Ciao

Sean,
As Jim says, it has been going on for centuries.  But part of "Humble golf " is the "quiet".  No one knows it exist except for the guys in that area and they can't afford nor do they need to let anyone else know.   

[Jim_Kennedy]

Sean,
That's surely one question I have. Once the club machine is up and running there is little reason to throttle it back, unless it means survival.

[Thomas Dai]

Here's a photo tour of a course/club that's about as indigenous as I can think of and has terrific greens without a sprinkler system  - http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,48765.0.html - and the annual subs for full 7-day membership are £439 per year - and far from slumming it IMO, although an individuals personal expectations and aspirations etc will vary I guess. Each to their own.
ATB

[Jim_Kennedy]

Jim

I think we know it can be sold to folks who don't want to blow loads of dough on a game.  Are you asking will people forego their country club conditions to slum it on a permanent basis? 

Ciao

Sean,
As Jim says, it has been going on for centuries.  But part of "Humble golf " is the "quiet".  No one knows it exist except for the guys in that area and they can't afford nor do they need to let anyone else know.   

Those courses weren't built as attractions, who's doing that nowadays?

[Peter Pallotta]

Something tells me that in years to come it will sell itself, especially in America -- but it will be a multi-faceted and partly unconscious and almost mysterious process/evolution, one that we really can't control or proscribe. I've long thought (in an opinion based on nothing but a feeling) that Ballyneal will keep going higher and higher in the rankings in years to come (culminating in it being a contender for the top spot); its look, its feel, its style of play, its location, its architecture with its peace and freedom, and its indigenous-ness, all these will combine to see Ballyneal's true value raising in the eyes of more and more golfers. Similarly, I think a course like Wolf Point -- which from day one has felt to me so completely at home in its Texas location -- will been valued more and more, for many reasons but mostly (if, as I say, partly unconsciously) for its at-home-ness. This quality, as I say, will sell itself I think. As people's homes and streets and stretches of sprawl move with increasing speed to looking ever more alike, and as our electronic world broadens out to make us all ever more connected (in one sense), I think the go-local ethos and the quality of at-home-ness will resonate more and more.

Peter
 

[SL_Solow]

Like many topics, I think this discussion has devolved to an unnecessary "either or" proposition.  First, I categorically reject Barney's characterization of the roles and goals of superintendents.  Golfers continually push for "better" conditions.  Supers try to give it to them.  In my experience, they tell the club what the improvements will cost and the club decides.

But turning to the larger question, many of the agronomic advances have been developed in order to allow course to become more "indigenous".   Take as an example, Mike's reference to ultra dwarf Bermuda greens.  Originally, greens in the area that Mike references were confined to sand or some form of common Bermuda.  Golfers found these greens to be less than desirable.  So the turf industry went to work.  Heat resistant strains of bent were developed.  While these are wonderful for hot summers in northern climes and work well in some transition areas, they have weaknesses in the south and southwest.  So the next step was hybrid Bermuda (or ultra dwarfs) which are closer in playing characteristics to bent but do better in the south.  Is using these grasses truly indigenous golf or is it simply a further adaptation of scientific work which used indigenous grasses but bred them to create characteristics more attuned to the desire of golfer?.

I suggest that as the need to conserve water becomes more acute, golfers will become more tolerant of "brown" while at the same time the turf industry will work to breed grasses that work under the new conditions.  Currently, there is some interesting work involving pigmentation which may help to further improvements in this area.  Is this going to e indigenous?  You define the term.  But I suspect there will be a move to grasses and other materials better suited for their climates, soils and related conditions.  

[RJ_Daley]

Isn't the entire theme of the indigenous golf course to use the local characteristics of terrain and climate to design or route a playable version of golf that attracts the indigenous people, including the economic accessibility of the average local to play there?

I agree Shelly, that advances in agronomy and botany to research and develop strains and cultivars that thrive efficiently in particular climates, is not excessive nor does it go against 'indigenous' golf, if it doesn't boast the cost to manage the new strains beyond a point of self defeating the goal to promote the local people to play and enjoy the game/sport.  

I guess one of the most extreme examples of bringing a designed by architecture out of place look from out of the locale by artificial means is Shadow Creek.  I heard Winn and Faz gloat about how they transplanted North Carolina to the desert.  This seemed to me to be the ultimate arrogance of man with too much money and not much sense.  Sure, it is only for those that can afford such luxury.  But, it sets such a poor example if we think of Mike's theme of indigenous golf.  

[Grant Saunders]

I just realized today that the problem with asking these questions here is that they are answered by the people who are most hurt.   The golf industry of over over paid supers, architects and power hungry greens chairmen don't want change. They feed on the corpuses of dead courses and forgotten members. Fuckem all and the raters horses they road in on.

John,
So many of the industry you mention have only been trained in that manner.  It's sort of like the tennis women you see at so many clubs who worry all day about keeping up with the Jones, who their husband is sleeping all while taking three or four different medicine for anxiety. They think the little redneck girls are looking at them and yearning when they have no idea the little redneck girls are just having a blast being themselves.  

 
I think this will be one of the bigger hurdles.

The modern day super has every tool at their disposal and have been schooled in an environment where anything is achievable as long as you keep throwing money at it. He/she is highly competitive and focused on attaining the highest standards possible and are able to operate a symptom based management program. They like growing high quality/purity swards of grass and it will be a hard sell to convince them to dial back their own expectations. I doubt you will find a super anywhere who is keen to work with less than what they do now.

As for science breeding new strains of grass that thrive in different environments, nature has been doing that for thousands of years. If those species cant be managed to achieve what golf demands, perhaps golf isn’t meant to be played there.

I don't know how to take some of JK's comments about those of us that make their  living from golf...BUT he's much closer to right than wrong on the subject.  

Mike

I agree with what you are saying here.

The industry should serve the game, not the other way around.

[Jud_T]

Isn't part of the problem that a significant and influential segment of the US private club market is selling exclusivity and status and not simply golf?  If you plunked down 50-100k up front and are spending 10-20k per annum in dues before setting foot on the property you're not just expecting a fun game and a quick round, you're expecting perfection.  Some clubs have a great tournament history in addition so golf is a priority and that is part of the status they're selling.  

[Tom_Doak]

TD,
"That is the real essence of Scottish golf -- firm and fast is only a byproduct."  I wish more truly understood that...  and Gavea...when I was in Brazil doing some work in the late 80's Mario Gonzales was still around.  He took us out there one day for lunch and to let me see a monkey on a golf course.

Mario Gonzales was still around as of a couple of years ago [as professional emeritus] - RTJ Jr. had him listed as a co-designer to try to manage the politics of his Olympic bid.  [How the two of them became a team, I will probably never understand.]  My favorite part of Gavea was seeing how the locals from the neighboring favela would try to "fish" for large iguana in the jungle above the course by putting a bit of meat on a string.  That's pretty indigenous

[Tom_Doak]

Isn't part of the problem that a significant and influential segment of the US private club market is selling exclusivity and status and not simply golf?  If you plunked down 50-100k up front and are spending 10-20k per annum in dues before setting foot on the property you're not just expecting a fun game and a quick round, you're expecting perfection.  Some clubs have a great tournament history in addition so golf is a priority and that is part of the status they're selling.  

Jud:  Yes, but the other part of the problem is that every other private club in the market tries to follow suit and compete with the big ones on exclusivity and maintenance, instead of exploring the other end of the market.

[Mike_Young]

TD,
"That is the real essence of Scottish golf -- firm and fast is only a byproduct."  I wish more truly understood that...  and Gavea...when I was in Brazil doing some work in the late 80's Mario Gonzales was still around.  He took us out there one day for lunch and to let me see a monkey on a golf course.

Mario Gonzales was still around as of a couple of years ago [as professional emeritus] - RTJ Jr. had him listed as a co-designer to try to manage the politics of his Olympic bid.  [How the two of them became a team, I will probably never understand.]  My favorite part of Gavea was seeing how the locals from the neighboring favela would try to "fish" for large iguana in the jungle above the course by putting a bit of meat on a string.  That's pretty indigenous

Tom,
The Nicaraguans who were working on the irrigation installation of my first Costa Rica project would kill iguanas with slingshots for lunch.  They would grill the tails.  They had no problem finding one or two per day.
As for Mario Gonzales and RTJJr. becoming a team.  His nephew used to be the captain of Sao Paulo GC.  I spent a few weeks there in late 80's and remember they were close.  His name was Ricardo Rossi.  Anyway, RTJ Jr. did a complete redo of Sao Paulo GC if I am correct and they probably connected there.  Well, as I just googled his name I see that he is now a designer in Brazil and sometimes with Mario....oh well...

[Sean_A]

Jim

I think we know it can be sold to folks who don't want to blow loads of dough on a game.  Are you asking will people forego their country club conditions to slum it on a permanent basis? 

Ciao

Sean,
As Jim says, it has been going on for centuries.  But part of "Humble golf " is the "quiet".  No one knows it exist except for the guys in that area and they can't afford nor do they need to let anyone else know.   

Those courses weren't built as attractions, who's doing that nowadays?

Jim

Now you are into the money side of the game.  If a guy wants to make money owning a course, he is almost forced to go high end because that is where the money is.  Not many people are going to explore a business with $35 green fees.  It can be done, but its a tough road that I wouldn't take.  If the build was done cheaply or a course was bought cheaply (say $2 million debt), at $35 a round the guy probably has to sell 30,000 rounds to break even.  Everything over that is what he makes.  So I reckon if the course is very well managed and weather etc is cooperative, at 40,000 rounds a guy can make a good living even if he won't have time to spend it!  That sounds like a lot of rounds to me.  I think that guy better know his market very well.  

Ciao    

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