The Par-3 2nd Hole, The Mushroom Farm Golf Club
The Mushroom Farm Golf Club is a fantasy course designed on an actual piece of property near Dryden, Michigan, located in the thumb approximately 30 miles southeast of Flint. The site is that of an abandoned mushroom farm, on which I actually worked at as a teen, picking mushrooms out of the growing beds. The plot of land is 170 acres of woods, streams, and ponds. I am a REALTOR, and sold the property to a friend of mine. While I was walking the property I thought how cool a golf course would fit on this piece.
This is a very unique and interesting - so far - project for me. The local area
around Dryden only lends itself to a public course, and an inexpensive one at
that. No country club here, mostly blue-collar workers, farmers, and medical
mariuana users :-) With that in mind, I created a budget that I thought would
work financially for the area, and designed a fairly standard yet challenging
public course. I keep track of how much time I spend on each hole and charge
that time to the hole. This converts to dollars spent within the budget.
I started out with a Google photo and survey of the property. The survey is
the actual one used for the purchase of the property.
The Google photo I played around with until I had the scale down right, matching
the survey, then using a ruler I routed the course to fit the property. The
final routing was about the 4th attempt, in which I decided that purchasing
the extra property with the house and barn made the most sense financially.
Where possible I have utilized again the two-holes on one overhead concept.
Again, keeping in mind the location and local economy there is little terra-forming
done, the course fitting into the natural environment, trees, ponds, stream,
roads and lot lines as close to actual as possible.
The 2nd and 16th greens. The creek traverses the entire property from west to
east. I designed the 2nd green to fit in one of the curves. Someone, don't know
who, lined almost the entire length of the creek with stone as it meanders from
west to east into the large pond.
One of my favorite design features is to have the player drive or hit the ball
directly at a hazard, usually water. As most players below college or pro are
not able to control the distance of their shots it creates some tension when
required to hit it at water.
The ninth hole is a long par 4 but plays downwind, skirting the driving range on the left. A good drive gets you this approach shot to the green.
The par 3 15th hole was carved out of a stand of trees, creating a chute that funnels the prevailing wind to the green.
Stock objects (except some grass objects I have used a
lot in other courses), sky, and horizon; textures from Brian Silvernail.
Download The Mushroom Farm Golf Club
Email: chris@cfurg.com
Chris Furgerson JN6 Course Design