Greatest Clay Soil courses

[Robin_Hiseman]

The course I'm building right now is cursed with heavy clay and it looks like the next one I'll be tasked with designing shall also be on desperately thick clay.


I need some reassurance that outstanding results are still possible and some sources of inspiration won't go amiss.


What do you think are the great clay golf courses?


I'll take Oakmont as a given. Where else?

[Ryan Coles]

I'd be interested in the answer to this from a narrower UK perspective. I don't think there are any greats but will be interested in those that are deemed the best.

Note: nominations can't have 'heath' in the title.

[Ally Mcintosh]

Is Augusta not on heavy soil?

[Sean_A]

Walton Heath is famously on clay soil and it is quite evident that when a load of rain comes down the course gets very wet.  I think its fairly rare for lowland heaths to be on clay soil. 


I think Little Aston too is on clay soil.


Ciao

[Mark Bourgeois]

Walton Heath is famously on clay soil

wut

[BHoover]

Walton Heath is famously on clay soil

wut

The pics I've seen of Walton Heath suggest a course in top nick and built of sand. The idea of clay seems bollocks. But what do I know!

[Sean_A]

Walton Heath is famously on clay soil

wut

Si...see page 6. The fine grasses are there, but not the sandy soil...and this is very evident in winter...especially the greens..which are soft even when fairways are good.  The real story is how in the heck does the club keep the course as dry as it does? 

However, I have said it many times before, the heathland courses are a very poor second to links when it comes to drainage. Part of that is due to the serious compromise of the heathland qualities over the past several decades.  At best we can say that heathand courses, with the exception of Walton Heath, are really hybrid parkland/heathland. 

Caring for Walton Heath

Ciao

[Ryan Coles]

The sand belt is a bit of a myth. The drainage qualities vary greatly between clubs. Most are still pretty wet all winter and just small amounts of clay seems to make a difference. 99% of inland courses would probably swap though.

I was lucky enough to play both courses at Sunnindale a couple of weeks ago just before the foursomes. The contrast in firmness and condition between the new and old was staggering. The new was bone dry with almost flawless greens. The old was boggy with the greens compacted and squelchy.

Same budget, same practices, same course manager but the slightly heavier soil (and probably the trees) meant conditions were greatly inferior on the old. Windlesham next door was closed that day and the following day.

[James Bennett]

Robin

I was surprised at how heavy the clay was at Merion East.
When I played there in 2006 (gosh, 10 years ago), the area on #2 between tee and fairway was being hollow tined, and nice, big, solid reddy-brown sticks of clay were all over the place, as clay cores!

Lots of slope and surface drainage there, and a network of adjacent surface drains (ie creeks) to shift the water away quite quickly.

James B

[Tom_Doak]

Years ago, I wrote in an article presenting the top 100 courses that 16 of the top 20 were built on sand.  (George Peper still uses that factoid from time to time.  So does Mike Keiser.)

The four that aren't:  Oakmont, Merion, Augusta, and Pebble Beach.  I don't know if Pebble is "clay" but it's sure not sand.

There are, however, tons of parkland courses that are not on sand:  Winged Foot, Quaker Ridge, etc.  There's also Cuscowilla, or Rock Creek.

[Sean_A]

In my mind's eye I see wet clay particles clinging together acting as a wall against water which doesn't exactly leak, but instead water sweats through the clay at a desperately slow pace in terms of golf...think of water in an unglazed clay mug.  I live in the Midlands which is notorious for clay soil and combined with broad leaf grasses...its just about the worst combo for golf...especially winter golf. 


I would really like to have been around when Dr Mac designed Cavendish...very wet climate around the course. I don't know Dr Mac courses well enough, but I always had a theory that Cavendish was designed as a more aerial course to best suit the climate, soil and turf.


Ciao

[Thomas Dai]

The extent of tree, scrub, longer grass etc coverage has a part to play here. Reduce the coverage and let the wind and sunlight help (rather than hinder) the drying out process in the first instance.



Atb

[Sean_A]

The extent of tree, scrub, longer grass etc coverage has a part to play here. Reduce the coverage and let the wind and sunlight help (rather than hinder) the drying out process in the first instance.

Atb

ATB


For sure, but run of the mill clubs seem to be reluctant to even devise long term plans to improve drainage.  I would think this should be the #1 priority for a huge percentage of Green Comms.  Despite folks saying winter golf is not important and drainage is an area which can't be combated, there is still a big market in the winter.  Our second course has started to get serious winter income...refugee golfers from nearby clubs....And of course, the better a course drains in winter means the odds of the course being good in summer increase.  However, heads will remain stuck in what we can only wish is sand.


Ciao

[Adam Lawrence]

Walton isn't straight clay but clay over the underlying North Downs chalk. Having said that there is ten-fifteen feet of clay across much of the property, interspersed with flint and suchlike, so how much influence the chalk has I don't know.


I do know, as I've written on here before, that Fowler wrote that they were fortunate at Walton to be able to go as far below grade with their bunkers as they liked. If they stayed wet, they sank a shaft from the bottom of the bunker through the clay to the chalk and filled it with old pots and pans to ensure that it didn't clog up.

[Jon Wiggett]

Robin,

as Sean says Walton Heath is the best example though Little Aston is another. Just make sure you get you main drains in as deep as you can (minimum 4 foot but 5 to 6 is better) and then the secondary drains at least 3 foot at the shallow end. This will make a MASSIVE difference to the long term drainage and also prevent the drains silting up. I have seen drains set at 2 foot silted up after 18 months but where I am now I have some drains at 6 foot and below that have been in over 200 years and are clean as a whistle.

Jon

[Sean_A]

Walton isn't straight clay but clay over the underlying North Downs chalk. Having said that there is ten-fifteen feet of clay across much of the property, interspersed with flint and suchlike, so how much influence the chalk has I don't know.


I do know, as I've written on here before, that Fowler wrote that they were fortunate at Walton to be able to go as far below grade with their bunkers as they liked. If they stayed wet, they sank a shaft from the bottom of the bunker through the clay to the chalk and filled it with old pots and pans to ensure that it didn't clog up.

Adam

Do you know how deep the clay is?  Also, do you know if more than one shaft could have been dug in some bunkers?


I think of WHO as one of the best bunkered courses in England...remarkable this could be achieved on clay soil.


Ciao

[Neil White]

I have been fortunate enough to play Little Aston a couple of times per year for the last few years and have seen a slow decline in the overall condition of the course - it has become very soft, particularly at holes 11 and 12 which have recently seen some extensive drainage works completed. 


These new drains didn't seem to be as deep as Jon suggests in his post - more like 2 feet maximum - so the jury is out on these.


Incidentally, I personally believe that the greens at LA are a more pressing concern with what appears to be a extensive thatch problem.  I played a few weeks ago after a relatively dry spell and they were very soft - a few minutes persistent rain during the round led to them showing significant surface water - not good.

[Neil White]

If they stayed wet, they sank a shaft from the bottom of the bunker through the clay to the chalk and filled it with old pots and pans to ensure that it didn't clog up.

I think of WHO as one of the best bunkered courses in England...remarkable this could be achieved on clay soil.

Ciao

Not really Sean - clay will hold water but if you are able to sink a soak away through the clay into a permeable surface such as the chalk then provided you keep the soak away clean you shouldn't encounter any real problems. 


Geologically Walton Heath seems lucky in this respect.

[Adam Lawrence]

Walton isn't straight clay but clay over the underlying North Downs chalk. Having said that there is ten-fifteen feet of clay across much of the property, interspersed with flint and suchlike, so how much influence the chalk has I don't know.


I do know, as I've written on here before, that Fowler wrote that they were fortunate at Walton to be able to go as far below grade with their bunkers as they liked. If they stayed wet, they sank a shaft from the bottom of the bunker through the clay to the chalk and filled it with old pots and pans to ensure that it didn't clog up.

Adam

Do you know how deep the clay is?  Also, do you know if more than one shaft could have been dug in some bunkers?

Sean, as I said above, I think it's up to fifteen feet deep, though not evenly across the heath. No idea re multiple shafts. I don't know whether Fowler's method was carried on with newer bunkers either.

[Adam Lawrence]

This from Fowler on the soils at Walton:


"[size=78%]No really good grass is grown where the drainage is bad, but the heath is on the chalk hills of Surrey and, though there is from six to 20 feet of varying soils over the chalk, it is always perfectly dry and even in the wettest weather never becomes really soft."[/size]

[astavrides]

Do you have to water courses less if the soil is clay, rather than sandy?

[BCrosby]

There is clay and then there is red Georgia clay.


The category winner is ANGC. Next are Cuscowilla and Peachtree. Also in clay is Mike Young's Longshadow which I look forward to revisiting.


Georgia clay is close to impermeable. Sheet drainage is the deal. I think some of the changes to the 7th and 10th greens at ANGC were likely made to fix drainage issues that MacK didn't fully appreciate.   


Bob

[Robin_Hiseman]

Interesting stuff so far. Thank you all. I would appreciate a few more suggestions as to excellent courses on clay. I had Merion as a probable, so am glad for confirmation of that.

I am always surprised to hear that Walton Heath is on the clay. It bears no physical relation to any clay course I've ever played. Can someone explain how the heather is so successful, given heathers are generally not commonly associated with clay soils?

I am grateful to Jon for his drainage advice. We are putting in a lot of perforated drainage at Woodseat Hall, none of which is as deep as he recommends, ostensibly because of the material cost of backfilling trenches to such depth, but also because we need to link in with the set levels of the outfalls. The ditches I've designed are routinely 1 metre deep and judging by the base scouring after their first winter are working as planned.

[Adam Lawrence]

Interesting stuff so far. Thank you all. I would appreciate a few more suggestions as to excellent courses on clay. I had Merion as a probable, so am glad for confirmation of that.

I am always surprised to hear that Walton Heath is on the clay. It bears no physical relation to any clay course I've ever played. Can someone explain how the heather is so successful, given heathers are generally not commonly associated with clay soils?

Very low pH

[Robin_Hiseman]

I don't buy that Adam.

Clays are typically alkaline and nutrient rich. Doesn't tally with a low pH, especially if the clay is overlying strongly alkaline chalk.