GOLF NOTES

Southland Times, Issue 24448, 30 May 1941, Page 9

GOLF NOTES

EFFECT OF GRAZING ON COURSES

It is safe to say that very few committees managing golf clubs are in favour of grazing sheep on their courses. Sheep pollute a course and to keep it reasonably clean it is necessary to use regularly a' brush harrows or some such implement. • They do serious damage to bunkers and scald the putting greens and in the way of manure they put back on to the land no more than they take out of it. Nevertheless, as a war measure, more than a few clubs in Britain have agreed to pasture sheep on their courses and the green committee of the Royal and Ancient Club was willing to take a limited number, even on the sacred fairways of the Old Course. But the land is public property and the last word lay with the Town Council of St. Andrews, which turned the suggestion down. In tire meantime, therefore, sheep will not desecrate the turf trodden by the feet of golfers famous and unknown, very good and lamentably bad, from all parts of the world. Only Mr Churchill The well-known British professional Percy Boomer is contributing to. some golf publications just now a series of articles in which he looks back pleasantly on his experiences. He tells a story in which Britain’s great war Prime Minister makes a characteristic appearance. When he was pro. at Burton-on-Sea, an excellent English course, he had a caller one morning. Boomer relates what the visitor’s purpose was and what followed: “He told me that a very prominent politician was coming to to play that afternoon and, as far as possible, he did not want it to get round. I said I would do my best to keep it quiet and the course clear. I played directly behind the party and at about the fifth, which ran parallel with the sixth, my sliced right into the politician’s party. He at once went across to apologize. ‘What did he say?’ I asked when my partner rejoined me: ‘Oh! that's all right, it’s only me.’ The ‘only me’ was Mr Winston Churchill.” Local Courses In Good Order Local golf courses are in very good order. April was a wet month, the total fall of 5.15 inches being an inch above the average, and over four inches of rain have fallen this month. But the courses cannot be described as wet. TTie ground was so thoroughly dried out by a hot summer, and between falls of rain in the last two months we have had so many drying northerly winds, that the courses are remarkably firm. The cutters have been out both at Otatara and at Queen’s Park to deal with the “back-end” growth of grass, and when the fairways will carry the tractors and gang mowers there is not much wrong with them. Putting greens are still well grassed and present a good surface. Last week-end was fine and mild, and players were out in light shoes and sleeveless pullovers. The numbers playing at both courses, though far short of those of two winters ago, are quite satisfactory in. present circumstances. The interest in competitions is perhaps rather languid, but it is right that competitions should continue and those who take part in them should as far as possible concentrate on the effort to win. Competition in sport has its value today and should not be neglected. But the game is played mainly for recreation by men and women who want healthy exercise in good company and fresh air and in a form sufficiently absorbing to enable them to forget everything else for a few hours. These conditions prevail pretty well throughout New Zealand. A northern writer observes that reports from nearly all parts of the country are that matters are quiet with the golf clubs, but that the season will pass off satisfactorily, and that comment applies pretty well all round. While the membership of most clubs has fallen, chiefly by the enlistment of active players in the armed forces, those who have to stay at home will see to it that the courses are kept going. Apart from their own interests, that is a duty they owe to the men who are away. A New Golf Ball

Tlie war between the golf ball manufacturer and the course designer goes on. Though the authorities have set hard and fast limits on the size and weight of the ball they cannot prevent the expert in the laboratory from working away to improve the construction of the ball and the materials from which it is made. A leading firm of makers in the United States is now advertising a new ball, the feature of which is an “oil cushioned centre.” It is claimed that with this centre there is transmitted from the head of the club to the ball a larger proportion of propelling energy than has ever before been pcssible—result, still greater length. If the performance of the ball justifies the claims made for it (and, since the patient worker in the research laboratory is always improving things, there is no reason'why it should not), it looks as if there are some more headaches coming to the good people whose job it is to preserve the dignity and prestige of their courses and to retain some degree of real difficulty in the tests of competitive golf. The 400-yard hole used to call for two accurate, fullblooded blows with wooden clubs; under favourable conditions the topnotcher today smacks the ball home with a drive and an easy shot with a lofted iron. Courses have been lengthened greatly as a defence against the enterprise of the club maker and the ball manufacturer, but the champions still tear the pars and scratch scores to tatters, and if the ball is to be given still greater length what is to be done about it? Fortunately the great body of players will not be worried. For them the 400-yard holes are still hard enough to get in fours, and good as the ball at present in general use is, if the manufacturer can produce a new one that will fly 20 yards further that’s the ball they want. Kirkwood’s Heavy Loss

Joe Kirkwood, the greatest golfer that Australia has produced, master of the trick shot and unrivalled showman, has for many years now made his living at the game with headquarters in the United States, and there he recently suffered a severe loss by a fire which completely destroyed his shop at the Huntingdon Valley Country Club, Abington, where he has been professional for just over a year. His premises were burned to the ground. He had a stock of over 4000 clubs, 60 dozen golf bails, and a miscellaneous store of all sorts of high-grade equipment. His own stock was valued at £3OOO and in his shop were 130 sets of golf clubs belonging to members. In his travels throughout the golfing world Kirkwood had collected a number of interesting things associated with the game and he had two clubs with historic associations with St. Andrews of 100 years ago, and one club with a flexible rhinoceros hide shaft which wound around his neck when he took a swing. Kirkwood has travelled farther afield than any golfer who ever lived, comments the Golf Monthly, Edinburgh. He came to Britain first in 1921 and immediately won all round popularity which never languished. He never spared himself before the crowd at championship times and good-naturedly gave many an exhibition of his wonderful range of trick shots. S