Is a golf course good or bad, environmentally speaking? Many think it’s bad, using precious water resources and occupying prime real estate while appealing only to a select few. Wouldn’t the plant and animal life, and society in general, fare better with all those acres of land used in a different manner?
Not necessarily. A golf course, in fact, offers more in the way of plant and animal value than a tract of land under conservation easement..
Last week, I was playing Lake Monticello, and right beside the tee box, I saw something that has become a rarity – a stand of milkweed, numerous plants. Milkweed today is looked upon as an undesirable weed and something to be eradicated. You would never find milkweed on a farm under a conservation easement because all that land has been converted into fescue-covered fields. Weeds and native grasses can’t live in fescue. It’s too thick. Fescue has no environmental benefit whatsoever except for erosion control. Deer will eat fescue, but prefer most anything else.
Milkweed, as many know, is vital to the survival of monarch butterflies. Monarch caterpillars eat milkweed and milkweed alone. The course superintendent at Lake Monticello has allowed milkweed to prosper in several areas.
And bluebirds? I have seen more bluebirds on golf courses than anywhere. Many golf courses post bluebird boxes throughout and also at the point where the hole is 150 yards away. Bluebird houses and boxes erected by golf courses have helped these beautiful songbirds prosper in the face of competition from non-native species like starlings.
There is always lots of wildlife on golf courses. The last two bobwhite quail I heard whistling were at golf courses, one at Old Trail and the other at Greene Hills. There are also deer – naturally – plus foxes, raccoons, rabbits and small game animals on golf courses, plus many species of birds – even pileated woodpeckers.
This year, I have not seen a single honeybee in my yard, and I seed with clover. But I have seen numerous honeybees in the second and third cuts of rough on local golf courses.
Golf courses also offer lakes and ponds – home to ducks, geese, water-nesting birds as well as bullfrogs, fish and many other forms of aquatic wildlife.
Seeing that stand of milkweed reinforced my belief that golf courses provide not only an important source of recreation, but many environmental advantages as well.
Land under conservation easement is a taxpayer gift to a very select few with no recreational and few if any environmental returns.
I’d say let’s build more golf courses and put an end to those conservation easements that serve only to benefit wealthy landowners.