The average golfer enjoys water about as much as the Wicked Witch of the West in "The Wizard of Oz." Those teeing up at Eisenhower Golf Course, a tree-lined public layout in Crownsville, might have even worse nightmares than the norm.
Thick, native grasses up to 3 feet high surround every creek and pond, reaching toward the sky as though part of a fiendish plot to snag wayward shots.
"I tell the players we have great sales at the pro shop," says course superintendent Mike Papineau in joking reference to the fact that golf courses resell the balls they find in hazards. "Some appreciate it more than others."
It's not that Papineau, a 26-year-old turf specialist, is some kind of golf sadist. No, allowing foliage to grow untouched next to bodies of water aids in establishing root systems that filter out impurities, helping prevent golf course chemicals from entering the surrounding water table.
It's one of many steps Papineau has taken to enhance the eco-friendliness at Eisenhower, one of two courses in Anne Arundel County to be certified as a cooperative sanctuary by the International Audubon Society.
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