So I noticed that we have this golf category here at W4, but that we hardly ever have posts in it. So why shouldn't I, who know absolutely nothing about the game (I mean, really nothing), put one up? True, it will tarnish my reputation for "awful fanaticism," but even fanatics have to take a break sometimes.
I am indebted to Bill Luse for the information, which all you southerners probably already possess, that there are alligators on the golf courses in Florida. I mean, real alligators, just sitting there, no fences or anything. They live there. The golfers just count on their moving on when they (the golfers) get close. Or not, as the case may be. I understand the adults just sit there and stare at you. This gives rise to the following burning questions:
Have any golfers in Florida actually been bitten, or eaten, by alligators on the course?
Should you get a free drop (I had to look up what a free drop is) if your golf ball lands near an alligator and he doesn't go away?
Comments (17)
Such an odd thing to think about. I mean, I'm a native Californian. The only place we see wild animals of any kind is the zoo. Imagine finding a real alligator on a golf course. Boggles my mind.
Posted by RobertK | September 19, 2009 5:34 PM
It may sound weird, but they are really docile and usually small. You really don't think much about it after the first couple of times you see them. I have never known anyone that actually got tangled up with one in a normal round. Actually, it has been more usual to have kids on the course teasing the gators than the gators bothering anyone. But I am no expert on the subject so all of this is just from experience.
Posted by Jay Watts | September 19, 2009 5:43 PM
Well, I've never seen one on a golf course (as I've never been on one) but growing up in FLA I have been within feet of dozens of gators. As for bites, it's very rare for a person to be bitten. Usually it's animal control people or zoo personnel etc and almost always accidental. Rare enough that it makes the news when it happens. Now, small dogs is a different story.
Posted by DmL | September 19, 2009 6:28 PM
I'll take y'all's word for it, but I'm glad I'm not doing it. I gather you aren't allowed to take small dogs out golfing with you anyway.
Posted by Lydia | September 19, 2009 8:13 PM
Play 'em where they lie!
Posted by Keith | September 19, 2009 9:44 PM
No alligators in North Carolina but avoid the high grass, there lurk water moccasins. I don't know anything about drops but my wife, the golfer, doesn't worry about the rules when she spots one of those vipers.
Mostly near the shore.
Posted by johnt | September 20, 2009 10:42 AM
I foresee that our readers from Florida will tell us that water moccasins are much more dangerous than alligators. I suppose in a way I would see their point. Perhaps the snakes are more aggressive, not to mention harder to spot ahead of time.
Posted by Lydia | September 20, 2009 12:54 PM
Moccasins are not the kind of snake you want to mess with. They can be horrifyingly aggressive. They had to shut down an entire golf course in Atlanta a few years ago because of a particularly savage serpent.
I once saw a small gator in south Georgia on a golf course. I took my lead from my father-in-law, who was quite unfazed by the beast, which just sat in the sun and never bothered us.
Posted by Paul J Cella | September 20, 2009 9:05 PM
Ha! I called it. I defer to knowledge by experience in this case.
What about the free drop, Paul? How close would a ball have to land to a gator before you felt fazed by the thought of playing the ball where it lay?
Posted by Lydia | September 20, 2009 9:18 PM
I don't know what the official rule is in that circumstance, but it seems to me that common sense might dictate that, for safety's sake as well as the game's continuation, the offending alligator ought to be shot and killed. It wouldn't surprise me much if the meat were edible and the skin could always be used for boots or somesuch. And, if not, who cares?
Posted by Risa Tyi | September 21, 2009 12:21 AM
I've seen alligators, and some really big ones, for years on courses in Florida. But only once did a gator make a move toward me, it was many years ago at a course north of Naples. On the first hole with water down the right of the fairway I decided to hit my iron shot in spite of a 10-footer sitting in the sun about a dozen steps away. In my backswing I saw him move quickly toward me, and by the time I stopped running I was all the way to the green about 150 yards away. When I looked back, it looked like he had taken only a few steps to find a sunnier spot. Needless to say, I missed the shot (and was out of breath for a few holes)
Posted by Deal Hudson | September 21, 2009 2:49 PM
Troublesome alligators are usually removed to more removed locations than golf courses. They are not usually killed.
We occasionally have alligators in my parent's lake behind their house. This lake is rather small, maybe a mile in circumference, and is surrounded by houses. There aren't many fences to prevent a gator from wandering up a lawn and the gator usually isn't removed. Tons of children in the area too. Problems are very rare and I've never heard of an injury.
Posted by Bryan Rosander | September 22, 2009 12:37 PM
But probably keeping a Pekingese and letting him run around your back yard wouldn't be wise. If you wanted the Peke to live to a ripe old age.
Posted by Lydia | September 22, 2009 12:39 PM
Oh, my. The Southeastern Coastal plain is overrun with these vermin. Why, in 2007 a recreator in Lake Marion SC (pretty well inland) had his arm chewed off by a gator and woulda died except he emerged from the lake lacking an arm into the company of a bunch of picnicking Catholics!
No kidding:
http://www.cdnn.info/news/safety/s070917.html
I live in Upstate SC, and even up here we get the occasional gator...not to mention all the ones we run into when we vacation on the coast....again, no kidding.
It's casual.
Posted by Christian | September 22, 2009 7:43 PM
Oops, Lake Moultrie. Upstaters don't keep up with those flatland lakes.
Don't miss the photo at the link of the gator with the arm in its mouth.
Just another good reason not to move down South.
Posted by Christian | September 22, 2009 7:53 PM
Here's an "incomplete" ">list of fatal alligator attacks in the U.S. The victims range in age from 2 to 83.
The most unusual were probably the 3 women who were all killed within 4 days of each other in 2006, all in Florida.
Posted by William Luse | September 23, 2009 6:17 PM
I screwed up the link: http://tinyurl.com/gj4kk
Posted by William Luse | September 23, 2009 6:20 PM