The effects on the Maple River of a golf course designed to minimize impact on a stream.

Abstract

With the growing popularity of golf, golf courses are being constructed rapidly. These courses are often built along streams. Construction and maintenance of golf courses involves aspects of logging and agriculture, which are two major sources of stream degradation. Therefore, the potential exists for golf courses to impact stream quality. The study site was chosen to represent a course built to minimize impact to the stream. The impact of the golf course on the Maple River was studied. Hilsenhoff Family Biotic Indexes and Shannon Indexes were computed up and downstream of the golf course. No impact of the golf course was noted in this study.