pesticides man…
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Nice,
I have seen an high altitude golf course in ladakh - the greens are called browns, and so on – not sure about grazing animals but it seemed a bit better than what we associate with golf, (water, pesticides, and so on)
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Yes,
and @tristanrush welcome to the forum.
Also your two worder makes me think of a new supervillain -
introducing the fearsome and deadly pesticide man
generated from here https://freeimagegenerator.com/
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There was a study done some years ago urban spatial dynamics of Lepidoptera and the effect of land subdivision and development on their ability to spread out and recruit successfully. What they found was that even in the presence of some properties that had flattened, manicured lawns with just 1 or 2 bushes on the sides, many species could recruit successfully and have ample means of travelling to and from lek sites and foraging grounds provided that the full blown “lawn” properties were randomly and consistently interspersed with properties where there was a clear trend of copying the landscaping of the surrounding environment with many indigenous or even exotic green patches and corridors
I imagine the same would be true for a land use such as a golf course, but one has to have an understanding that with drastic habitat change for facilities like golf courses, sports fields, and BIG gardens, it really is only a subset of organisms, mostly certain orders or families, that stand to be able to endure and maybe thrive in such conditions
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was it this study
Thomas, C. D., & Harrison, S. (1992). Spatial Dynamics of a Patchily Distributed Butterfly Species. Journal of Animal Ecology , 61 (2), 437–446. https://doi.org/10.2307/5334
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It could be, but I think the one I’m referring to was published in the early 2010’s, can’t remember if it was done in the US or UK but it would have been a continuation of this study with perhaps a greater emphasis on observation in declared and established urban and peri-urban areas
I recall this study done some years ago: Avian species assemblages on New Mexico golf courses: surrogate riparian habitat for birds?
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At least 2 golf courses have been built on or close to highly protected areas (SSSIs) and in one case with disastrous consequences, resulting in destruction of the unique habitats.
On the other hand many other links courses do keep decent patches of habitat, although there are probably always risks from pesticides and fertiliser spreading from greens & fairways. Parkland courses in S. England usually have replaced intensively farmed agricultural land, and are almost certainly an improvement ecologically. At least in the UK & Ireland there’s a good chance that most plants, including grasses, on a golf course will be native (or long introduced species). This isn’t true elsewhere.
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I will try and find that.
Thanks
I’m no player, but on the odd rare occasion, I have been dragged along to complete a foursome with friends who are regulars. I can confidently say that there never were any birdies involved (at least, not on my cards).
Bogies, on the other hand…
And we played on the closest and cheapest course in town which was run by our municipality and built right on top of a former landfill. (Some interesting aromas if you were downwind on the seventh, if I recall.)
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ha ha , this is good one
why are landfills such a common area for golf courses ?
My guess is that they are expensive and problematic for regular construction. Mitigating excess settlement, landfill gas, and strange odors isn’t something business owners like, but a city who already owned the land could spread some dirt, seed some grass, and start a golf course.
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I suspect the toxicity of former landfills is considered too high for full-time occupation, but safe for shorter exposures.
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In our area, the largest filled landfill started as a huge limestone gravel quarry. Instead of a golf course, this one was made into a ‘natural rehabilitation’ park with trails. It’s mostly meadow, small wooded area and a pond. I have got a lot of IDs out of it.
Still, I can’t help be saddened by the continual scraping away of our so-called world heritage nature site (the Niagara Escarpment) by the gravel industry.
They always build berms with thick trees around a quarry because the sight of all that natural destruction is just too much of a publicity risk for the same companies that are major and generous donors to so many local community causes here.
There’s an extra level of irony that they are major corporate sponsors and supporters (campus buildings, scholarships, etc) of the local college and university – the same places where one goes to earn a degree in environmental sciences.
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what we say. Not what we do.
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But modern ones shouldn’t be toxic for what’s above them? If done correctly and then e.g. reforested.
I remember an article about a golf course in Australia that got flooded over in 1996 and ended up depositing a population of bull sharks into its ponds. As of 2020 they’re still there, thriving and reproducing somehow. Just a fun story about how life finds a way, I guess
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I am not sure how the remediation is done in such cases.
If it was safe enough to grow a forest, I think the powers that be would rather build a high rise .
Actually far from true. Trees / nature definitely lives often where humans should not / could not. Either they are unaffected due to different biologies or they live too short lifespans for it to matter.
Not many think about such things but where do you think all the chemical crap from WWII went when we confiscated a ton of it from germany and russia? It couldn’t go to normal landfills. A lot of it came back here, where it often got burred and forgot about on bases. Burry those metal drums, it’s fine right? That was the thought back then! Wrong, of course we know today. Metal rusts, corrodes, breaks down…things leak. A lot of it is inert at this point, even solidified, but it is still a huge mess to clean up. I think it has 80ish years left on the project to dig stuff up, test to determine what it even is, and properly dispose of it, now that we know better than we did back then. It’s literally multigenerational project. Those who started it will belong retired and even dead before it is finished.
A lot of the most forested natural spots (where you cannot build a building for toxic reasons) are where the worst of it is. You can literally overlay the soil toxicity map with satellite and it lines up great for the one near here xD Sometimes it’s good enough for storage, but not for buildings.
So anyway. Yeah forest does fine in toxic soils you can’t put a human building on. :)
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Sometimes also deliberate phytoremediation - on mine spoil heaps for example.
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