Water Hazard Bordered by an unfenced backyard

During a friendly match a few weeks ago, a scenario came up that stumped me and caused some debate amongst our group. The scenario is this.

The tee shot for a par 4 is bordered by stream on the left hand side. The stream is about 5 feet wide and marked by lateral (red) stakes on the right. On the left, there are a long row of houses, set about 50 yards in from the stream. Between the two is a vacant grassy area - presumably the homeowners' backyards.

The problem is that the course nor the scorecard actually marks "out of bounds" anywhere on the hole. One of my buddies pulled his tee shot so far left that his ball cleared the stream and landed in the grassy area. My first instinct was that the ball was out of play, but he argued that in absence of OB markings, his ball was in play. I couldn't argue this point, although it didn't "feel" right to me. Following his logic, a terribly hooked ball could still be played off some poor shmuck's back patio (although the owner might have something to say about that).

Is this just a case of a course not properly marking their boundaries? What if one of the homeowners put up a sign that said "private property" and planted it on his property line. Would that affect things?

The course probably wants players to treat it all as a lateral hazard and take a drop for sake of time.

That's possible, but it still gives anyone the option to legally play from that "backyard" area as long as they don't ground their club.

All I can say is that I'm not playing from anyone's back yard.  That's a good way to get shot.

Hard to say without actually seeing it, but if it even remotely looks like it's somebody's back yard, I'm not even going in to get my ball - let alone playing a shot from there.  But in a technical sense, your friend is correct - if there are no markings and no local rule, then he could play from there - now, whether he should or not is another (probably more important) matter.  Goes back to the old saying, "Just because you can doesn't mean you should".

Sounds to me like it should be marked better.  If the whole thing isn't actually back yards, there should at least be OB stakes delineating the property lines and something on the score card about it.  As to the last question, if the homeowners have "Private Property" or "No Trespassing" signs posted, then it's definitely verboten .

Is there anything on the scorecard that address when a ball lands in a yard.  I've seen local rules there sometimes.

If the ball lands in someone's back yard, I'd say that ball is out of bounds. The back yard is not part of the golf course. I would not want you hitting your next shot from my yard. Get out of my garden. Sorry.

You are confusing the Rules of Golf with the law of the land, Julia! The definition of the course has no mention of property rights or land ownership.

" The " course " is the whole area within any boundaries established by the Committee (see Rule 33-2 )."

If the committee has failed to establish boundaries, there are none.

Having said that, common sense would dictate that you take your medicine and go back to the tee but a committee would have no leg to stand on if a player took advantage of their failure to establish a boundary.

The problem is, at least from the situation in the OP, it doesn't seem like the course (or the residents) have clearly defined what is back yard and what is part of the course.  If it's just a 50-yard deep,  wide open green belt with no OB markings and no obvious signs of it being a yard (signs, fences, swingsets, patio furniture, gazebos, etc.), I can see where there could be room for confusion.  I would always err on the side of caution when it comes to possibly intruding on somebody's private property, but it seems to me that the course and/or homeowners should make the effort to clearly mark the boundary line to remove any doubt.

I've only ever played one (very shoddy) course which had a similar issue.  Every other course I've played, it was very clear where the course ended and adjoining back yards began.  Not that there aren't still idiots who will climb fences and go into yards to retrieve their balls, but clearly marking it will keep most people out.

See, as a home owner, I'd check the rules of golf and pound some white stakes in the ground around my property AND put up a fence. Especially if the course was too cheap to put the damned things in there. There, it's Out Of Bounds. Deal with it.

At a local course a homeowner has a nice, new, white ball a few feet onto his property. When a golfer snags the ball it triggers a water jet right at the offender - funny to see!

This was the issue, exactly. And in the case of our buddy, he was close enough to the course that it might be reasonable to assume he wasn't on private property. Trouble is, we had no way of identifying where the course ended.

I would do the same!

Strange local rule at Tidewater in Myrtle Beach.  Housing along the fairways yet there are no OB stakes.  If you hit your ball into a yard or flower bed in a yard and can find it, you get free relief on the opposite side of the cart path away from the yard.  However, if you don't find it, then it is simply a lost ball and you must replay from where ever you hit the last shot.  See people walking in these folks yards all the time searching for their ball.  And, there are no fences along the golf course.

That is true, Rick. A friend of mine ran a PGA Section event there years ago and pounded 700 stakes, which he had to remove after the event!  There is another section event coming up soon, I wonder if they will do the same thing?

The committee has no right or authority to include property not belonging to the club/course as art of the course.  Therefore I would argue that regardless of markings by the committee, if a ball is in an area that is not owned by the club/course it must be, by definition, out of bounds.  In this case I think that the law of the land would override the ROG.  A Committee cannot incorporate land the club/course dies not own/control, into the course, so there are boundaries, clearly, they are just not marked.  There are always boundaries.  The fact that within the owned land the committee has complete control does not eliminate the existing property line boundaries.

In this case the problem is the combination of not marking the OB line and not marking the property line. If the committee did nothing at all in the way of marking, but the homeowner put some indication of the location of the property line, if the ball was over the ,line then IMO it would still be OB.  The OB definition references, in relevant part, the boundaries of the course.  And these depend on law not ROG.  The committee can do whatever it wants within the boundaries of the course, but the property owners legal rights on their own property will be upheld against the ROG every time, in court.

See it's also a liability thing on my part as a property owner. If the course allows you to trespass in my yard to retrieve your ball or even hit it out of my flower bed, legally I assume liability for the time you are in my yard. If you are injured, you could sue me. Therefore I want you to stay out. Fences make for good neighbors. And with golf courses, boundary stakes do, too.

Therefore, I need a deterrent. White stakes and a fence, and probably some barbed wire fencing and one of these to deter people from climbing over.

You make a good point re OB definition but it doesn't really say what 'boundary' means. The definition of OB and 'the course' seem a bit contradictory; taking the course definition alone I would stand by my original post.