Spring is the hardest

[heywillard90]

This probably applies to all outdoor activities

Right now in chicago, early spring has generally started and a ton of snow melted in a short time. It might be combination of all that snow melting and low temperatures, but I find spring to be the hardest months of the year to play in. On my home course, the ground is so saturated with water that everytime I take a step, a puddle of water rises to the surface. And it usually stays like this until may. I would bet if we got sun until the end of april, the ground would still be too muddy and flooded to play in. Its very frustrating. I would like to know if this is the case in the rest of the country, especially the mid south and east coast.

 

[bikinjack]

A couple of holes on the front 9 at my local course are soaked, but they're flat, and right beside a creek that occasionally floods, so what would you expect? We usually play them anyway. The back 9, however, is not flat, and water runs off of it, and is always easily playable. A few times this winter, after a good rain or a little snow, I would just play the back 2 or 3 times, and skip the front altogether.

 

[heywillard90]

Imagine that flood you talked about, but for 65 days straight as the weather warms up. Thats what it feels like here, to me atleast.

 

[Roc1Time]

It usually rains alot here so our courses are wet most of the time too

 

[therealbigtrav]

I think the hardest part of the spring dg scene here, is that the winter courses start pulling the pins to keep the turf from being torn to shreads. I understand that it's necessary for the betterment of the course, but it's hard when you have a beautiful day after a long winter, and can't play your favorite courses.

 

[edward felcohands]

Yeah, the weather may be nice around milwaukee in the spring but the mud drives me nuts. My buddies say "I can't wait for spring" and i'm thinking what, you can't wait for two months of solid mud?" I'd much rather fall down in snow than mud.

 

[mashnut]

Yeah, I went out and played earlier this week and had to do some wading, there was mid-calf deep water over most of the 9th hole that still had ice floating in it. Not a fan.

 

[NDABRUSH]

This probably applies to all outdoor activities

Right now in chicago, early spring has generally started and a ton of snow melted in a short time. It might be combination of all that snow melting and low temperatures, but I find spring to be the hardest months of the year to play in. On my home course, the ground is so saturated with water that everytime I take a step, a puddle of water rises to the surface. And it usually stays like this until may. I would bet if we got sun until the end of april, the ground would still be too muddy and flooded to play in. Its very frustrating. I would like to know if this is the case in the rest of the country, especially the mid south and east coast.

About half of the courses in North Louisiana have flooded holes here and there but not enough to make it unplayable. A couple of holes get moved (seasonal) because of a river or a lake rising. Nothing like you are talking about. We just don't get the all winter long snowfall that many of the states above us receive. If we did it would be worse because we are only about 18 ft. above sea level along I-20. The cool thing about our limited amount of courses is that all but 1 of our Northern courses are off of I-20 between mile markers 10 and 115. The southern courses are not off of major interstates for the most part and are overall lower quality except for the 2 Acadiana courses and maybe the newer private course. (Kissena)Sorry for babbling, hope it dries out soon for you guys.

 

[bikinjack]

Imagine that flood you talked about, but for 65 days straight as the weather warms up. Thats what it feels like here, to me atleast.

Yeah, I feel for you. While parts of the front 9 were flooded, I was still playing the back nine.

 

[valkyrie]

Its the same here in GR

 

[esjaygee]

Yeah, the weather may be nice around milwaukee in the spring but the mud drives me nuts. My buddies say "I can't wait for spring" and i'm thinking what, you can't wait for two months of solid mud?" I'd much rather fall down in snow than mud.

I just played my first ever spring round (at Dineen in Milwaukee) and the entire course was pretty much covered in water with a few patches of snow and ice. I wouldn't have thought it to be the case, but I agree with you that I would have preferred snow to the sloppy conditions I played in today. But sloppy disc golf is better than no disc golf!

 

[Chucktown]

Yeah, even though we didnt have rain here in Missouri for at least a week, the course I always play still had some good wet spot. There was a lot of skiing down down the hills on a mud slide. I am so ready for some hard packed dirt and clean tee boxes.

 

[Rol6566]

Im in western PA and we had about 18" of snow at one point and in the last week it all melted. Add this to the rain we are getting now, and the course is a mess.

 

[sapples]

In addition to the mud, its always super windy here in the spring.

 

[solomon.trenton]

MA has the same problems especially in the valleys

 

[Fender088]

I'm from Chattanooga, but I moved two hours south to Carrollton, Ga for college. To the untrained observer, this distance wouldn't seem like a big deal at all. What the map fails to show you is that Chattanooga is surrounded by mountains, and Carrollton is at the foothills of the Appalachians. I never really had to deal with wind at all in Chattanooga because the mountains protected us from everything. Carrollton isn't Chicago windy or anything, but it still took some getting used to.

People also don't seem to realize that the southeastern US gets around 15" more rain per year than Seattle, so the rain has been a really bad problem all winter, and it continues to be. The forecast for this week is rain every other day. Just enough to not let the courses dry out.

 

[wolito]

I don't let the weather stop me. I usually always disc in boots with Goretex and don't have to worry about getting my feet wet. I think that if I would have to wait a few months for the weather to improve in those areas I would go crazy.

 

[TxDiscGolfBoy]

This probably applies to all outdoor activities

Right now in chicago, early spring has generally started and a ton of snow melted in a short time. It might be combination of all that snow melting and low temperatures, but I find spring to be the hardest months of the year to play in. On my home course, the ground is so saturated with water that everytime I take a step, a puddle of water rises to the surface. And it usually stays like this until may. I would bet if we got sun until the end of april, the ground would still be too muddy and flooded to play in. Its very frustrating. I would like to know if this is the case in the rest of the country, especially the mid south and east coast.

It get's super nice and wet here in TX with big rains and storms. This year it even snowed heavy a couple time.

The soggy courses down here usually stay wet for about 3-4 days, then it's dry again. This is mainly in part because of the high sun and the super high winds at times. It may get wet, but it does dry out quick. Quicker than a lot of places I would think.

 

[superium]

Yea I agree I hate the first couple weeks of spring golf. I want to step more into my drives now but the muddy/wet teepads dont allow it and my timings all off. Not to mention muddy/wet discs, I think Ive had more discs slip out of my hands in the last couple of days then all winter long.

 

[Cyclops]

Agreed, Spring is not the optimum DG season. I've come to the conclusion, to never grade or review a course that I play in the Spring. I'm just glad to get out and play after Winter and don't have high expectations. I expect the worst and if I don't have to deal with it. It's a good day.