Hole #2 - Ways To Be Wicket

This is another pretty simple little hole.  The putt is only about 8 feet but you have to hit it through three wickets and off the wooden peg, which serves as the flagstick for the hole. 

There is plenty of room to hit a ball through the wickets so their effect is mainly psychological.  The stick must be left in when putting so a putt struck too hard or a little off-center will bounce off it without going in.  To add a little more difficulty to the hole you are not allowed to get relief if your ball comes to rest against one of the wickets (you normally get to move your ball 6 inches away from borders and obstructions).

Hole #2 Tee	Hole #2 Green

Hole Development

I had the idea to base a hole on croquet--you know, the game you play on your lawn where you hit big balls with mallets through wickets (or hoops) into a colorful peg that was stuck in the ground.  It came together pretty much how I planned it.

At one point when my brother and I were playing a round, he complained there was no good place to set his drink down.  After that I built some little shelves that not only hold your drink, but also serve as a scoring table.  The first one on the course appears on this hole.

Handy shelf to hold your drink and give you a place to write down scores.

How It Was Built

This is the first time I tried having the green be flat on the ground rather than elevated.  The hole is sunk directly into the ground.  The "wickets" are landscaping anchors (that you use to hold weed block and such down) that I had lying around.  The croquet peg is actually an old broom handle painted with colors of any paint I had left in the garage.

The two boards which contain the tee area and the green are held together by mending plates screwed in underneath.

On this hole I also where I first added leftover plywood pieces covered with carpet scraps for the golfer to stand on when teeing off so they wouldn't have to stand on mulch (mainly I did this so I didn't feel compelled to put shoes on to play).  I used cheap plastic tent stakes to hold these down.