The Fabled "Green Jacket" is the Least of Our Worries

Suppose you cared as much about preserving the environment as you did about shaving strokes off your average golf round.
Where would you turn for solutions and inspiration?
It may come as a surprise to learn that certain courses go the extra mile to ensure that their water usage and upkeep measures and landscaping habits are friendly to the local ecology. Magazines like Links and Golf, in fact, keep running lists of the golf destinations that give “green” a whole new meaning.
Tracking down ways to do your part to help Mother Earth sustain us isn’t easy. And the validity of all the “eco-conscious” golf goods and services claim is tough to verify.
Still, if you’re the average player who cares about the future of the game and whether the planet can afford to sustain it, the options are worth exploring. Right?
Here are a few humbly submitted suggestions. If you know of alternative ways to play golf with a “green” mindset, we’re all ears…
SLIVERS OF HOPE: The Eco Golf Company claims that some 2 billion golf tees are put in play every year in the U.S. That’s a lot of wood and plastic being plugged into the ground, smacked around and (often) forgotten. Eco offers a variety of tees (sold in bulk) made from fibers that are meant to degrade as naturally as potato peels over time. Instead of defacing the grounds, they’re meant to incrementally enhance them. Visit the Indiana-based company’s web site for product and pricing details.
PLOP PLOP, FIZZ FIZZ: What golfer hasn’t found himself out at sea, atop a mountain or even snowbound and felt the urge to strike a ball out where there are no boundary lines. The Eco company asserts that it’s got an answer for those who can’t fight the temptation; though they probably realize the average ball shot without regard for where it lands could pose short-term health-threats to creatures, and long-term damage to the planet. The Eco Golf Ball is designed specifically for a short iron shot out into nature’s nether reaches, where, under optimal exposure to water, they’ll dissolve within a week . Again, visit Eco for details.
TRULY GRINDING: Alternatively, the Dixon Earth company markets golf balls that perform adequately on the course and are touted to be made of materials that are “100 percent recyclable”.

U.S. Golfers Dwindling in Numbers

I play at an inexpensive, Marshall-free, “anything goes” 9-hole course just on the outskirts of downtown Atlanta at least once a week .
More accurately, I should say that I work on my game there. I’m an impatient fellow. And since the nubby track known fondly to locals as “The Course of Champions” is often outrageously overcrowded, it’s not uncommon for me to save 30 or 45 minutes by walking off after the steep, par-4 seventh hole.
Every course I play inside the perimeter, in fact, seems packed beyond proper pace of play capacity.
That’s why I was surprised by the recently released National Golf Foundation report that says active participation among recreational golfers remains in a slow but steady decline.
According to the report by the Jupiter, Fla.-based NGF (founded in 1936 to promote the game), ”The slight downward trend in the number of golfers in the U.S. continued in 2008, falling 3%, from 29.5 million in 2007 to 28.6 million in 2008”.
The study, conducted by Chicago-based Synovate counted anyone age 6 or over who played at least one round per year as a “golfer”, and 42,000 Americans were surveyed.
The numbers were tweaked in numerous ways to uncover the bitter and sweet truths: The NGF reached a conclusion that “negative growth in golfers is corroborated by a drop in rounds played volume of 1.8% in 2008 vs. 2007. No doubt the economic recession was a factor in the decline of both measures.”
And NGF president and CEO Joe Beditz summarized that, “The challenge for the industry is to slow the loss of existing golfers while increasing the retention rate of those who come in each year."
But, as I said, there’s no apparent shortage of hackers in my neck of the woods. Just (un)lucky I guess. How about you?

Caddies Keep Hope Alive

If you’ve never played a round of golf with a veteran caddy on your bag, aspire to do so. It may cost a pretty penny, but the experience may prove priceless.
Having a caddy in tow to suggest where you aim, how hard to swing and which club to use won’t guarantee you a great score.
I learned that the hard way recently during a chance-of-a-lifetime opportunity to play the Golf Club of Georgia in a PartnershipsInAction charity event benefiting impoverished women and children in the Third World.
As luck would have it, the three other scheduled players in my foursome were no-shows. Unsettled a bit by their absence, I steered out toward the 15th tee of the glorious and intimidating course for the shotgun start alone.
But it wouldn’t be long before the burly, bearded caddy who introduced himself to me only as “Barlow” made his presence felt.
Barlow wound up blessing me with a lesson on wielding my wedges confidently that was more than worth the generous tip I palmed on him after the round. He recognized my natural fade after two holes and directed me accordingly; to the point where we were confounded on what shot to play once my swing with my new/used Si3 (9 degree) Ping drives straightened out and my trusty old copper Zing 5-iron found unprecedented punch.
I won’t bore you (unless you ask) with tales of how many ProV 1s I sacrificed to the mercilessly long and wide marshes that guard many of the GCG’s fairways. Nor will I complain about all my three-putt pratfalls on the private course’s swift, sloping and expansive greens.
“Barlow” had no control over the blustery (10-20 mph) winds that I’ll use for an excuse for my score. My solitary experience with him on one of the southeast’s finest tracks did, however, breathe rejuvenating life into my game.
Yours Truly (above): Photographed by "Barlow"