Vandalism to the Course

[TheLauncher]

Over the weekend at my home course a minor or minors decided to drive four-wheelers on three of the greens, doing a fair amount of damage. The grounds crew has done their best since to fill the ruts in with sand and make the greens playable, but with six or so weeks left of good golf weather remaining this is a serious blow to our little course, not to mention a personal affront to so many of us who treat the place like home.

Has anyone ever had any similar experiences at their courses, and if so what recourse, legal or otherwise, did you have in such a situation? Any ideas on how to compensated most efficiently for the damage, or to keep incidents like this from occurring in the future?

Obviously I am quite angry about it and if I were to meet the perpetrator face to face I would have to restrain myself from physically assaulting him. I know I'm not the only one that feels this way, bus as I said earlier, what's important now is to repair the greens and be sure it doesn't happen again.

[kfowler]

Seen it happen a lot unfortunately. There was a course on the way to school where I grew up that constantly had problems with it. Place I played this weekend had some vandalism on one green. They were offering $1000 reward for information.

Best one I've heard was a kid decided to drive all over the green and got stuck. He ended up having to call a wrecker which was joined by the police. He was arrested. It cost $1000 of dollars to fix.

[shankapotamus]

At congress lake country club nearby. people drove trucks on the greens and did donuts around the 4th of July. I haven't heard of anything since about it.

[flopdarock]

yup... ive heard stories about ppl 4x4ing on the greens at the course i work at...
also some jackhole stole a monster truck and decided to test how deep some of the water hazards were and got stuck...
more than a few golfcart stories of guys tipping over... stealing them and taking them on the street... them being in lakes...
proshops been cleaned out a few times...
i think because this is a nicer course with no housing anywhere near it... its tough to catch anyone doing anything unless there was night security

[alf174]

There has been a rash of golf carts stolen from golf courses near me.

[naut22]

At one of the courses I frequently play they kept losing the flag sticks at night. They've since been taking them in each night which seems like a logical thing to do.

A week ago I stopped at a yard sale en route to the course about a half mile away that had a huge sign advertising Callaway golf balls. Interestingly, the people were selling the flag sticks as oversees golf memorabilia.

Morons.

[MI Rob]

A year or two ago people drove 4 wheelers on like 5 of the back 9 holes at my local course. You can still see them because there is a different grass where the ruts were. They also mess up putts too.

[microcrayfish]

One course I play at has had diesel poured all over the greens to spell out certain words and draw somewhat phallic images. The area is notorious for "boy racers" because it's a bit out of the way and there's not many houses around there but the police have cracked down lately so there haven't been any more issues.

[Big_M]

I have seen 4x4 damaged greens a few times in the past. People are such idiots.

Best Solution... small thin piece of fishing line or wire stretched about 4 feet in the air at various points in the course... then take it down during the day. Should effectively decapitate or seriously injure anyone acting like an asswad. Just make sure to tell the police that some annonymous member must have put up such wires... that way you avoid any legal entanglements.

[CG031]

No vandalism to the course, but once at a local nine hole course near me. Some high school kids were going out late at night, around 1 or 2 AM, and breaking into the cart barn and driving the carts all over the course. They were smashing them purposely into trees. They broke about 5 or 6 of the golf carts, no damage done to the course, though.