St Andrews Links Blog

The snowdrops are awake!

I know it’s only just February but there are snowdrops showing nicely in the grounds of the Eden Clubhouse. This tiny flower has made an appearance this past fortnight and is a sure sign that the longer days are drawing near – golf after work could soon be on the menu for the greenkeeping team.

The last two weeks has seen the environmental team getting stuck into some gorse management with plenty work being done across the Links. This is carried out for a number of reasons including strategic placement, visual implications and, of course, for the wildlife. Gorse has the potential to become gangly and long-limbed which eventually falls in on itself creating an untidy and unkempt look – this is where we step in and coppice it down to 150mm and allow it to regenerate to a healthy and compact state which is ideal for nesting birds.

A marvellous find presented itself to us during the gorse management; a dwarf earthstar fungus to be precise. This type of fungus is known to dwell in old and stable sand dunes which are a similar environment to where we found this one – I’m looking forward to next autumn to forage for some more! It is actions like this that have contributed towards the Links being awarded the much coveted GEO label for a further three years.

Here’s some of the team in action:

Daffy and Neil hard at work.

Hard work, eh Tom?

I have to say that wildlife sightings have been a little scarce of late with no new species showing up. The Eden greenkeeping team have noticed a magpie to the Balgove Estate side of the courses and they found a stone on the Strathtyrum Course which proved to be of real interest to us eco types. The stone is used by blackbirds to smash open snails believe it or not! Evidence of this behaviour is all around with broken and empty snail shells littering the area – isn’t nature fascinating?

The Eden Estuary, however, never fails to disappoint with peregrine falcons, sea eagles, knots, turnstones and a number of sanderling (pictured below) being spotted.

Words by James Hutchinson, Environmental Officer