The PGATOUR site has an interesting article with player reactions to Pinehurst.
I love the look, and hope that the US Open at Pinehurst encourages more courses to go in that direction. I would love to see my home course allow the areas off the fairways and primary rough go au naturale. There’s no need to seed, mow and water the acreage between holes. Not only would it be very cool looking—it would save a lot of money on water and gasoline.
The one problem with natural vegetation lining a course’s fairways is keeping the junk thin enough to allow one to find balls and play them. There are a number of SE Michigan courses which purport to be “links style” (Golden Fox, Hunter’s Ridge, Lake Forest. etc…). Unfortunately, once the vegetation takes hold, it grows so densely that no amount of effort allows one to find an errant shot and even if one did, the ball would be virtually unplayable.
Currently the set-up at Pinehurst allows one to find and play a ball from the junk. They will need to work to keep it that way.
My favorite prairie course is Calderone.
I coined “prairie course” a couple of years ago to more accurately describe midwestern courses that fancy themselves “links,” but aren’t within 800 miles of an ocean.
Perhaps ball-death grass would encourage people to tee it forward so they don’t have to start every hole with the least accurate club in their bag, and play every second shot with an only slightly more accurate long iron.