Golf Digest report urges its audience, industry to get ready for a water crisis, address concerns about chemical use.   5/30/2008 by Wayne Nelson

(Picture: Painting by Richard Schletty of Ross’ Teal Lake Lodge and Teal Wing Golf Club.)

Perfectly manicured, chemically treated championship level golf courses long have been easy targets in regional fights over rights to communal water resources, and efforts to improve water quality.

In general, the industry has changed some course management practices, but little more than necessary to avoid such criticism.

That’s why the May 2008 issue of Golf Digest, the veritable bible of golfing, turned heads with a 50-page special report, “How Green is Golf?’ and urged the industry to get out in front of a looming national crisis over water, and show real environmental leadership.

“There simply won’t be enough (water) to go around for golf courses to continue to do what they’ve been doing,” wrote staffer John Barton in an introduction to the report he compiled after lengthy research and long interviews with a golf course architect, anti-pesticide activist, organic golf course superintendent, government regulator, golf course inspector, turf grass expert and environmentalist.

“As water becomes scarcer, as organic management practices increase, as environmentalism and environmental legislation starts to bite more . . . the way the game looks will change,” he said.

On balance, the report is a call for the industry to take a proactive role in how and where new golf courses are built, and how they’re maintained.

You can count on plenty of resistance inside golfing to any serious eco-friendly overhaul of course maintenance practices. Managers have created the picture-perfect “Augusta look” that’s part of the Masters mystic. Will they embrace something wilder, more natural like the courses where the game began?

“We have to use chemicals,” said Paul Schintz, golf pro at the city-owned course in Duluth’s Lester Park. “Without them, golf will take a big step backwards,” he said.

The eco-friendliest courses

Meanwhile, the Golf Digest special report has received a friendly reception at Ross’ Teal Lake Lodge near Hayward. The Ross family, which has owned and operated the resort since 1921, gingerly developed their Teal Wing Golf Club in the heart of the Chequamegon National Forest in 1996-98 under the supervision of the Audubon International “signature course” program. There are substantial wild areas between the fairways and the course is centered on an intact stand of virgin hemlock.

Every tee not only has a tutorial for playing the hole, but also offers a naturalist profile of the surrounding terrain. The course uses no chemicals on its fairways and sparingly applies fertilizer on the greens.

“We’re intensely green here,” said Tim Ross, a third generation family owner. “The first rule here is ‘the bear gets to play through.’

“We laid out the course gently on the land, that’s why it is so tough from the back tee,” he said.

Tim and his wife Prue are stepping aside as their daughter Victoria takes over the family operation. “I think we were about 10 years ahead of our time when built the golf course, but other smaller courses have started to catch up,” Victoria said.

She hopes the Golf Digest special report will mark a turning point when attitudes of both golfers and golf club maintenance practices began to tip toward stronger environmental stewardship. “Educating golfers (about eco-friendly course maintenance practices) is incredibly important, and tough. What’s fascinating about the Golf Digest package . . . is the potential impact. It’s the bible for golfers,” she said. “They’re not big independent thinkers.”

Ross got a personal lesson during last summer’s drought. The water table dropped and she had to choose whether to use the irrigation system to water greens and fairways or leave water in the lake. She watered the greens but left the fairways to fend for themselves. The reaction of guests was mixed.

“Most were okay with it, but some were very upset,” she said. “Later some of those said ‘you know, you’re right.’ What we need is a happy compromise to get golfers and (golf courses) working together. It’s exciting to see us moving that way.”

Over the winter, she sent “two for one” special discount packages to about 1,500 of those customers in a marketing effort for return business. “Ask me in a month how that’s turned out,” she said.

Audubon Co-op Sanctuaries

The clear eco-friendly leaders in Northeastern Minnesota are The Wilderness at Fortune Bay near Tower, which opened in 2004, and Superior National at Lutsen, which opened in 1991.

Both are certified Audubon Cooperative Sanctuaries. The designation by Audubon International for established golf courses requires them to implement and document management practices in environmental planning, wildlife and habitat management, water conservation, water quality management, chemical use reduction and safety, outreach and education.

The Wilderness is the region’s longest course at 7,207 yards, and Golf Digest named it “Best New Upscale Public Course in 2005.” It is owned by the Bois Forte Band of Chippewa and managed by Chicago-based Kemper Sports.

Vincent Dodge, golf superintendent at The Wilderness, said water use and water quality management issues “are a very big deal” for the industry. “There are common misperceptions, a stigma, that golf courses are polluters, doing a bad thing. But the industry has cleaned itself up and doing more and more. Every year it gets better, there’s better training and the products we use are less toxic,” he said.

“The Audubon Sanctuary designation was pursued at the tribal council’s direction, and demonstrates what we are doing” to minimize environmental impact, Dodge said.

The Wilderness is using biodiesel to power its fairway mowers and regularly monitors wells and adjacent Lake Vermilion for phosphate and nitrate runoff from the golf course. Dodge said those tests have never detected golf course runoff pollution.

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