Snowmobilers who laid tracks down on every hole at the Thompson Golf Club in the first week of March may have laid the foundation for a miserable spring, especially for course superintendent Farrol Asham.
The trouble is, he won't know if there is any damage, or how bad it might be, until spring arrives and the snow melts away.
"Any time a snow machine goes across it," he said, referring to the golf course's grass, "it takes away your insulation."
Usually, that leads to dead grass.
"It doesn't look good in the spring," said Asham, who's encountered damage from snowmobiles before while working on golf courses in southern Manitoba.
Compounding the problem is the fact that whoever rode their snowmobiles on the course didn't just do it once, but came back for a second try three nights later. The initial incident was on March 4.
"Some kids went out on snow machines and tore the place up," said Dave Green, Thompson Golf Club second vice president, who heard about the initial joyriding incident when he was at the club for a meeting on Sunday, then found out on Tuesday the culprits had returned again, on the night of March 7.
It clearly wasn't a case of an innocent mistake, said Green.
"We have a gate and a fence and a sign - no trespassing - but they decided to go through the bush around it," he said.
A woman walking her dogs witnessed the snowmobilers marauding around the grounds while walking her dogs by the golf course.
"The lady who did see them Friday night said they were younger kids with the newer-style jumping snowmobiles," said Green. "She said that they didn't even care that she saw them."
This is the first time that snowmobilers have used the course as a personal playground since about three years, said Green, who has filed a complaint to police.
"I went to the RCMP and filed a report with them," he said.
The snowmobiles seemed to have ridden over every possible part of the course that they could, said Green - "every hole, every green, every tee box, every fairway."
Asham says the weight of the snowmobiles compacts the snow on top of the grass and enables ice to form if conditions are right. The trouble is, there's no way of knowing in advance whether damage has been caused or not. Asham says he isn't very hopeful after this incident, especially if Thompson experiences another cold snap.
"I don't imagine it's going to be very good," he said.
Asham says the people who did it might not even have been aware that their actions were potentially damaging.
