How do disc golf courses stop the damage?

I just played Seawright Park in Austin and the broken branches all over the course really caught my attention. They are not necessarily in the way of tee shots. It looks like they just want to break something. Twenty yrs. ago when the course first went in it was nice because the cedar trees were so thick every hole was private from the other holes. Now that may be the problem. If any course needed law enforcement this one does. Pease Park was closed because of the damage, is this one next?

The popularity of disc golf in Austin is hurting the courses there. Some day I think they may have to limit the number of days the course can be open. Paying to play might be the only way to pay for security on the course. What is it about noob disc golfers that makes some of them so destructive and disrespectful?  Any suggestions?

[David Sauls]

It's not always the new players.....

 

Don't know the specific damage you're talking about.  Popularity has its drawbacks; the increase in foot traffic causes erosion and soil compaction, and throws off the fairway inevitably result in damage to vegetation as players make their way through the rough, searching for discs.  That's all before any intentional damage is done.

 

If the problem is intentional damage, not sure we can do much about it except TRY to educate pepole that if you damage vegetation in your way, and I do the the same, and the next guy does the same, pretty soon we're playing in a desert.

 

Otherwise, it's the cost of our growth.  If 2% of players are idiots, back when only a dozen people played the local course, it was hardly a problem.  Now when thousands are playing it....well, you do the math.

[BogieWon]

More morons, more problems. Have yet to figure out how to avoid that.

[Larry Mann I am]

     Reason I put this up was to draw attention to it. And yes it is intentional damage.

[Justin]

When I was younger, we had a pack of coyotes that kept messing with our deer camp and riling our dogs. One night my dad and I waited for the coyotes to come. When they did, my dad shot one. We slit its throat and dragged it around the perimeter of the camp. Then a we nailed the carcass to a tree. Our coyote problems ended.

 

Disclaimer: I am not advocating killing a disc golfer. However, I think my story is a good analogy for showing that it is up to each of us individually to call out offenders and make an example of them.

[David Sauls]

Darn....I was with you until the disclaimer......

 

I think the best you can hope for is signs, on bulletin board or elsewhere, reminding people to take care of the course and not damage any plants.  It won't help with the hard-core vandals, of course, but perhaps the casual vandals will take heed.

 

Otherwise, absent of surveilance cameras or a well-positioned carcass, there's not a lot you can do.