Divots

[Marty Bonnar]

At Ladybank, we’re hosting one of the qualifying rounds for the Senior Open in ten days. In preparation, our greens team asked for volunteers to help with some divot-filling today and next week. I went along, both to see what the situation was and, of course, to help. We did seven fairways on the back nine. I must easily have filled a thousand divots. There were maybe twelve of us out there. Do the maths. Golfers are idiots.
 
F.

[John Kavanaugh]

Must be a lot of walkers. They fake fill at best.

[Marty Bonnar]

Must be a lot of walkers. They fake fill at best.

Funnily enough, John, there was ONE cart came through as we were a-workin’. Nobody carries divot mix, despite most Scottish golfers using electric push-trollies - and carrying the contents of a small European country therein.
F.

[Wayne_Kozun]

Do you guys not carry divot mix on your trolleys?  At my club in Canada they have them for the push trolleys - the same divot mix containers that are on electric buggies.  And tubes that attach to a bag for those that carry their clubs.

[Marty Bonnar]

Wayne, no.
It would be awesome if people did, but, despite the fact 83.6% of Scottish golfers use an electric trolley (yes, I made that stat up, but it won’t be far from the truth), few, if any, Scottish courses provide those divot mix bottles.
F.

[Pete Lavallee]

Seems like a trolley especially accessorized is the tipping point in this equation. I started pushing 2 years ago and my Big Max push cart has a nice optional sand bottle that attaches on a spindle that works great. From my experience golfers whose push carts  don’t accolade sand bottles are less likely to carry divot mix. We are lucky at my home course to have sand boxes on 1, 5, 7, 9, 11 & 15. You can sand divots to your hearts content all day, while waiting for your playing companions flail for the green. Divots seem to heal quickly if freshly sanded on Kikuyu fairways; the grass fills in horizontally due to the runners.


Just curious: what is the process for remediating fescue divots? Does filling them with sand help turf conditions or just smooth the surface for the Event?

[BHoover]

I agree completely with the original assertion that golfers are idiots. A few weeks ago, I decided to count the number of unrepaired or improperly repaired pitchmarks I repaired on the 9th green at my club. The number I stopped on was 77. I was the first person out on the course that morning. It was driving me crazy that I spent 10+ minutes on each green fixing pitchmarks that I walked off after nine holes.


The first lesson I learned, when I began playing golf in 1991 was yo always leave the course in better condition than I found it. Sadly that lesson seems to have been forgotten by far too many when it comes to repairing pitchmarks and divots.

[David_Tepper]

Based on the fair amount of golf I have played on seaside courses in Scotland over the past 17-18 years (and also on a few experiences of being on "divot patrol" there), I can offer a few comments.

Divots on sand-based/links courses are very different from the divots on most parkland courses in the US. The divots tend to be thin and flimsy. Given that the soil under the divot tends to be dry, even if you replace a divot and maybe step on it, the divot does not adhere to the soil like it does on most parkland courses.

Since the replaced divots do not stick in place very well, they can be blown out of place by the stiff breezes that blow on links courses. In addition, it is not uncommon for birds to pull away a replaced divot so that they can dig into the exposed soil for insects to eat. This happens quite often.

Even the best intentioned, non-idiot golfers can have they efforts foiled by the above.

p.s. But don't get me started on golfers who don't fix their ball marks on greens!

[Rob Marshall]

We have containers like the ones above for our walkers. They are always all gone after the first few hours of tee times.

[Craig Sweet]

Not filling your divots is yet another example of the decline in respect for the game. Fivesomes, music blaring from the cart, sunflower seeds spit on the greens...it's all so annoying.

[Daryl David]

Not filling your divots is yet another example of the decline in respect for the game. Fivesomes, music blaring from the cart, sunflower seeds spit on the greens...it's all so annoying.

Cigar butts, cigarette butts, tobacco spit, broken tees littering tees. The list goes on

[Thomas Dai]

David T makes some valid points above.
In addition, it might not take much time and effort to empty a divot bag but consider for a moment how long it will take someone to fill a large number of divot bags or containers, dozens and dozens and dozens them, and the effect that such will have the manpower at courses with only small numbers of staff and small budgets.
It might be more do-able with some kind of mechanical mixing and loading device but that'll likely be money off the budget too and if a clubs budget is small, well, they probably have other more pressing uses for their staffs time and the Clubs funds.
atb

[JJShanley]

I think my club in East Lothian has started using divot bags in the past few weeks.

[Sean_A]

I have seen divot bags sometimes. If I push I will grab one. I avoid it if I am carrying...which is usually the case. But to be honest, I so often push my ball to the rough to save fairways that I am not a problem. I don't see the point in digging up a fairway in winter or when the grass is dormant/very dry. I suck and its just for fun anyway. I wish others did the same. A divot from me is a rarity....and it gets replaced.

Ciao

[MCirba]

Not filling your divots is yet another example of the decline in respect for the game. Fivesomes, music blaring from the cart, sunflower seeds spit on the greens...it's all so annoying.

+100


If I were a Superintendent I'd be in prison.

[Peter Sayegh]

Back to the original post:
https://www.southerndowngolfclub.com/golf-club-wales/item/213-divot-bags/
I find this educational and polite. Do other clubs highlight this?

P.S. Complaining about cigar/cigarette butts on a golf course?!  I'll bet no one thought twice about it  from 1920-1970 (for you historians).

[David_Tepper]

Peter S. -

Thanks for the link to Southerndown. The club is certainly taking the right approach to dealing with the problem. I hope more clubs do the same.

One other aspect of divots on links courses I have noticed is that the "humps & hollows" can often cause golf balls to collect in the low areas on a hole. The divot patterns in those areas can become extensive. It might not be a bad idea to mark those areas as GUR for a few days every month or so to give the turf in those areas time to recover.

DT
 

[V. Kmetz]

All manner of divot mix dispensers, whether they be larger pour spouts (for carts) or individual tubes ought to be ubiquitous; I can hardly think what the situation might be without them.


The club where I still make a few summer rounds has a nice solution for the issue of "Refilling" tubes for use later in the round...on holes 3, 6, 12, 15 and 17, they have stationed a small lidded box which contains about 5-7lbs of divot mix.  These 5 refill stations are discretely located about 100-150 yards out in the rough, roughly where the forecaddie spots are on those holes.


The caddies and the responsible golfers refill there primarily, and while it really doesn't inspire many additional golfers (with or without a caddie) to become conscientious, it does make it easier for those parties who were always interested to do their part.  It also alleviates "some" of the labor issues in refilling, as the super's staff simply makes refill of the stations part of a weekly event, usually changed out/refilled by the staff assigned to trash detail, which are also dumped weekly/after a tournament.


The only unavoidable, inefficient drone labor devotion is with the cart man, upon whom it usually falls to fill the containers offered at the 1st/10th tee and the two large tubes on each cart.
 

[Kalen Braley]

"Wait us golfers are supposed to fill-in/replace divots?  What are we paying for, don't they have grounds crew to do that?"

I'm guessing at least half of golfers under 30 have that understanding. 

[Mark Smolens]

Based on the fair amount of golf I have played on seaside courses in Scotland over the past 17-18 years (and also on a few experiences of being on "divot patrol" there), I can offer a few comments.

Divots on sand-based/links courses are very different from the divots on most parkland courses in the US. The divots tend to be thin and flimsy. Given that the soil under the divot tends to be dry, even if you replace a divot and maybe step on it, the divot does not adhere to the soil like it does on most parkland courses.

Since the replaced divots do not stick in place very well, they can be blown out of place by the stiff breezes that blow on links courses. In addition, it is not uncommon for birds to pull away a replaced divot so that they can dig into the exposed soil for insects to eat. This happens quite often.

Even the best intentioned, non-idiot golfers can have they efforts foiled by the above.

p.s. But don't get me started on golfers who don't fix their ball marks on greens!

I'm wondering how much of a problem this is on links courses. . . in my limited experience (I've been across the pond 3x) playing links golf there simply weren't very many (as in no more than 2 or 3 total for all three trips even when playing in absolute downpours). In fact, I stopped putting my fancy Scotty Cameron repair tool in my pocket because it was never needed (and I tend to stab myself in the finger once every 5 or 6 rounds which can be very annoying)

[David_Tepper]

Mark S. -

Yes, pitchmarks on links courses are not a big problem. While I was focusing my comments on divot repairs to links courses, my comment on pitchmarks was directed more to courses in the US, where the greens tend to be much softer (and golfers tend to play more aerial shots into the greens).

DT

[Erik J. Barzeski]

I fill in my divots (though I don't take a bunch, I generally only bruise the ground/pick the ball), but a friend of mine on the grounds crew often didn't… because he said the fairway mowers picked them up and threw them around anyway. The divots don't grow back, either, he says. He didn't often fill them in at the course at which he worked. He works in the NC area now, different grass.

This is on poa/bent up here. We rarely have sand mix like in Bermuda type areas. On my recent trip to PH we didn't have many cart rounds, we mostly walked. When we had carts we had sand bottles. Most courses didn't have sand bottles for walkers with carts.

[Joe Hancock]

There wasn’t a lot of divot filling going on 30-40 years ago. A lot has changed since then. Mowing heights and golfer expectations are at the top of that list.