Flooded golf courses can turn up strange items.
And they also reveal the amount of littering that goes on.
A video post shows an amazing deluge of water swirling around the Redwood Park golf club in Swanson
The record rain knocked out the club’s irrigation system and left debris strewn all over the place.
However, course superintendent Dan Godek is hopeful of reopening by Saturday, depending on the weather.
“You take golf away from golfers and it’s like taking their children off them…they don’t like it,” said Godek, about the perceived pressure to reopen.
One of the main jobs will be clearing the course of branches, silt and rubbish.
Godek said during the last flood in 2021, a “sex toy washed down from somewhere”.
This time, the litter - everything from car tyres to wrappers and bottles - sticks in the mind.
“It must have been chucked out of car windows or blown in from people’s houses,” he said.
“It shows how much litter is out there.”
Godek said the club’s irrigation pump appeared ruined and a lot of paths required repairing.
Redwood Park was one of many of the golf clubs around Auckland that was hit. Scores of member volunteers turned up across the city for cleaning duties over the long – removing swathes of debris from fallen trees and overflowing creeks which had littered fairways.
Golf New Zealand group chief executive Dean Murphy said he was incredibly proud of the commitment and dedication the gumboot-clad ‘volunteer armies’ had displayed in getting their golf clubs back up and running as quickly as possible.
“I’d just like to say a big thank you to all those volunteers, along with the hard-working green keeping staff and course personnel, who literally rolled up their sleeves to face the task ahead and showed outstanding duty of service. Is it any wonder the game is in such a healthy state when you have a family of members like this who truly care for each other and their clubs?” said Murphy.
The Titirangi club posted that every bunker on its course needs rebuilding.
But Titirangi golf also had a good news story.
“Good luck to the greens staff this week - they have a HUGE job to do,” it read.
“And great that Titirangi could come to the rescue for a happy couple whose wedding venue was washed out.”
Josh Hazlewood grabbed four wickets for Australia’s red-hot pace attack.