"Conditions this year have been very difficult for us. Ours is a destination course and people travel from around the world to play here. If they get up in the morning and find the course is closed, we risk ruining the memory of their trip."
These are the comments made by Loch Lomond golf course supervisor David Cole after another year of torrential rain and miserable weather forced course closures around Scotland.
Bookings are down due to the weather and greenkeepers have been struggling to keep venues open because conditions have been so bad.
Head greenkeeper at Archerfield Golf Club, Darren Easingwood said: "We had ten inches of rain in August alone. Because the course is built on sand, it usually drains quickly, but this year I've seen water lying on parts of the course where it has never lain before."
Meanwhile, overly keen golfers are making a greenkeepers job more difficult because they cannot stay away when the course needs resting.
Alloa Golf Club head greenkeeper, Duncan Peddie said: "Trying to get the message across to golfers is very hard. The ones who don't listen can make life very difficult."
With rain in the summer brings favourable breeding conditions for fungal disease heaping even more pressure on overstretched greenkeepers. Further difficulties have been caused by fungal infections developing in the turf and fertiliser costs rising by 300 per cent in the past year.
Heavy rainfall has washed and leached fertiliser from the soil. A problem compounded at budget level because of the massive spike in fertiliser costs in the last year.
Stewartsturf grows turf for many courses in Scotland have grown tougher grasses to cope. Company boss Duncan Forbes said: "We have been working towards selecting grasses that will better withstand the wetter, cooler summers that Scotland has witnessed.
On our turf farm in East Lothian, we had 20 per cent of our annual rainfall in one day alone, and on many courses the situation has been even worse."
We will be touring Scotland in early 2009 adressing waterlogging problems.
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