Are You A Good Member?

I read a decent article last night, which asked a series of questions which pointed in the direction of a good member, if you did certain things. One of the questions revolved around something I've not heard of before, which is a members divot night. Head groundsman puts a note on the message board asking for volunteers to go out on a particular evening and spend a couple of hours walking the course in one big team, and start replacing divots and doing repairs etc. I thought it was a decent way to spend a couple of hours, so I must be a good member, how about you?

You know its quiet on here when the post of the day's about divots

It depends on when this event would take place as to whether I would participate. If it was during the week then it would be unlikely but if it's at the weekend then I would have a better chance at participating.

However when I'm playing and I see stray divots that someone has been too lazy to walk 10-20 yards to retrieve and replace I put them back. I know birds will sometimes overturn loose divots to get at worms etc. but these ones are typically not next to a fresh gouge mark.

Does this mean I'm a good and bad member?

Out of interest Doc, where was this article?

It's a good question Doc - our club has divoting evenings once or twice a year - and the management are good enough to put on a few snacks afterwards for those who join in. We have a good greens staff at our place but the divoting evenings are always well supported and the nice touch of a bit of food afterwards builds up a good relationship with the members and the management

I've not heard of divoting evenings before - sounds like a good idea though. I always try and repair a couple of extra pitch marks, and stick the odd divot back in if it's fresh.

I try to be a good member. If I can, I volunteer to turn up early at Lady Captain's Day, Charity Days etc to help get things ready beforehand. I also make sure that I say a friendly "hello" to any visitors in the changing rooms, as I know how unfriendly some clubs can be.

If I'm out on the course I'll fix unrepaired pitch marks and divots if I walk past them. I've noticed this only happens if I play during the week. At weekends everyone seems to be a bit more responsible and look after the course better.

Call me uncharitable, but I don't spend £1400 a year to spend my Saturday night on divot night. It's like going to the cinema and staying around at the end to clear up all the empty boxes of popcorn that others have dropped on the floor.

We have an artisans' section who help to maintain the course. They do a pretty good job.

Davie the article was in one of the freebie magazines at the club. Normally the only freebie is the local golf newspaper, but there was a mag this time around. pretty good mag too as it was full of decent articles and even one by Chubby on the Ryder Cup.

As for divot evenings it was a week night, not weekend and I like others on here hadn't heard of it before. The place in Yorkshire where I'm a country member has a system in place, whereby holes are allocated to members based upon their surname. For example surnames beginning with D are responsible for 8th and 24th, and the idea is that I along with all the other D's take a bit more care repairing divots and pitch marks etc.

One thing that did get plenty of mentions is the fact that membership is expected to fall off a cliff next year. The economy is being blamed as membership could be the single biggest bill anyone gets in the year. More and more players who can't afford or won't pay professing to be nomadic for a better experience. Clubs offering all sorts of deals to attract visitors and new ways of attracting members. The points system seems to be popular, but the overarching issue with more visitors and a smaller membership is the deterioration of the courses, as fewer members means fewer green keeping staff and more pay and play visitors not treating the course as they would their own

Quite a few clubs up here have "artisan" members where they get a reduction of fees in return for a certain number of hours maintaining the course, nothing major, just divot filling with sand/seed or litter picking in the main.

If you had just 6 of these members doing a couple of evenings work a month during spring/summer/autumn, Three holes each you'd have a pretty neat course during the growth months of the year. Solves the divot problem and gives a few less well off members cheaper golf for a year.

Rather than divoting evenings, at my first club the ladies (don't think the men did it) were allocated holes to look after and it was up to us to put all divots back on "our" fairways and repair any pitchmarks on the greens. It kept the course in pretty good condition and taught us all the importance of looking after the course at all times. Trouble was, it taught the men that they didn't have to look after the course at all because someone else would always do it.

They used to have regular midweek divoting evenings throughout the spring and summer at the club where LordPutt was a greenkeeper but the staff all hated doing it. They had to stay on after work, wait for the members to turn up (if they ever did) and then do a couple of hours extra work, driving the tractor which they also had to load up with the divoting mix (rootzone, sand and seed) without being paid any overtime! Please spare a thought for the overworked and underpaid greenstaff at all your courses.

Yeah, green staff are paid terribly. A friend of mine got offered a position at 16k plus you get constant grief from members who all claim to know more.