Can golf courses help save the planet? Ask a herd of wild pigs

• But no, this was not Just Stop Oil back for another round, nor the result of a disgruntled golfer.
• Javelinas (or peccaries) are small but feisty relatives of the domesticated pig, found across the southern US and into South America.
• A study of wild boar in Spain revealed that they raided golf courses less often during the COVID lockdown, when hunting was curtailed.

The bogey of management

• But these benefits depend on good management to create a mix of habitats, including flower-filled rough grass, scrub and woodland.
• Wildlife-friendly golf course management can even benefit the game itself.
• Water draining from these courses may be polluted with pesticides or nutrients that alter the algae in adjacent streams.

• French golfers have it easy compared with some of the creatures roaming the fairways in other countries.
• Florida’s golfers, for example, would do well to keep an eye out for alligators.
• The Arizona course staff were understandably horrified by the damage done, but the javelinas have their fans too.

Rewild the fairway

• In the US, the total number of golf courses is declining, with more closures than openings since 2006 – many of them abandoned with no new purpose in mind.
• Reversing the drainage from derelict courses could create new wetland habitats capable of stalling floods during heavy rainfall.
• Projects to reverse this damage and rewild golf courses are springing up in England, the US and Australia.

• The usefulness of pigs and their kin for grubbing up the land is widely recognised in rewilding projects.
• It has become fashionable among opponents of rewilding to criticise this approach to nature conservation for taking land out of food production.

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Mike Jeffries does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.