Course with no Red or Yellow Stakes

[Grumpter]

They use white stakes to denote out of bounds but no other colored stakes are used at all. 2 holes run parallel to each other with a pond splitting the fairways. It is clearly a hazard but is not staked as such so how do you play it? What about a stream that runs along side a hole. There are no white stakes marking it as out of bounds but also no other stakes.

[Grumpter]

Whoops. I meant to put this in the Rules of Golf forum.

[ColinL]

You should treat anything  unmarked that meets the definition of a water hazard as a water hazard (or lateral water hazard if it meets the requirements for that)  and use, as best you can, the natural margins of the stream/pond/ditch etc

[MyrtleBeachGolf]

They use white stakes to denote out of bounds but no other colored stakes are used at all. 2 holes run parallel to each other with a pond splitting the fairways. It is clearly a hazard but is not staked as such so how do you play it? What about a stream that runs along side a hole. There are no white stakes marking it as out of bounds but also no other stakes.

I honestly don't get this. It costs a couple dollars and a few hours to properly mark a golf course. Is it just laziness on the golf courses part?

[bkuehn1952]

"A " water hazard " is any sea, lake, pond, river, ditch, surface drainage ditch or other open water course (whether or not containing water) and anything of a similar nature on the course ."

I think most of us can recognize a sea, lake, pond, river, ditch, and surface drainage ditch, whether there is water in it or not.  The problem I most often run into with courses that are not marked is with marshes and swampy areas.  I do not think "open water course" describes the areas often found where water collects during the wet months and disappears as the summer progresses.  In April and May there are low spots with 1-2 feet of water but by July it is just a muddy, squishy mess that looks a lot like the surrounding forest.

We just had a tournament where the host course had absolutely -0- markings on a routing that had lots of wetland-type areas.  I have no doubt that among the 29 foursomes there were vastly different interpretations of whether an area met the requirements of a "water hazard" versus playing it as a "lost ball" in the adjacent forest.  When faced with this problem, our group told the player to play two balls but I would be surprised if some did not just identify the area as a wetland and use the water hazard procedure.

My hope is we do not return to that course or the course wakes up and makes an effort to mark areas that the original designer considered a water hazard.

[Grumpter]

I honestly don't get this. It costs a couple dollars and a few hours to properly mark a golf course. Is it just laziness on the golf courses part?

I don't get it either. It is one of the better (condition) public courses in the area and at a premium price for weekend rounds. I also had/have an issue with their online booking system that I contacted them about. They did respond but as far as I can tell they never fixed the problem. So maybe it is a management problem.

To top it off we played there early this morning so that we could get to work just a little late and still play some golf. We get to the 11th hole and suddenly there are 4 young kids (like 11 to 13 years old) just starting a playing session on the 11th hole. We had to follow them for 2 holes the second of which was a 500 yard uphill all the way par 5. One guy I played with timed his amount of time between shots and it was 14 minutes. Painful. Why would send a kids league out at 9am on a Thursday morning? Baffling.

[mchepp]

My friend would argue if it is not marked as a hazard then it is casual water.

[Grumpter]

My friend would argue if it is not marked as a hazard then it is casual water.

I didn't know what to do. Par 5 622 yards uphill all the way and I hit a tee shot in an area that looked like it might be red staked but didn't know for sure so I hit 3 from the tee. No stakes found so I played the provisional. It wasn't until the next hole where there was a small stream between the fairway and green that I noticed that there were no stakes (besides white) anywhere. The course even built a small bridge for the carts to go over but still no stakes.

[ColinL]

My friend would argue if it is not marked as a hazard then it is casual water.

If "it" meets the Definition of a water hazard, your friend would be wrong.  As I said, above, if it meets the definition, it is a water hazard even although the Committee has neglected its responsibility by not marking it (see Rule 33-2a) .

[Fourputt]

My friend would argue if it is not marked as a hazard then it is casual water.

Your friend would be wrong.

[ColinL]

Your friend would be wrong.

There's an echo in here.