Golf The history of Silver Birch
Silver Birch Golf Club (or Betws Yn Rhos Golf Club) is a picturesque 18 hole golf course situated in the hills above the beautiful North Wales coastline.
Bryn & Menna Jones created Silver Birch from their redundant farmland, with the help of Howard Davies of ADAS, an agricultural advisory board, and Stewart Finney, who designed the course. They diversified out of farming long before it became fashionable to do so.
Bryn says that, in the early 90s, there was nowhere for young people or adults to play golf. They felt intimidated by their lack of knowledge, of the rules, the etiquette and had no idea how to play the game. They didn’t want to spend money joining a club without finding out if they liked to play. So Silver Birch was created as a ‘Pay & Play’ course where everyone could play golf to their hearts content.
The course was officially opened by a local dignitary, Councillor Mrs Ena Wynne MBE, on the 24th June 1995.
When golfers have been with us a couple of years, they gain confidence in their golf and move on to the other clubs in the area. Many have been back to thank us for having the opportunity to learn how to play.
In 2002, the couple acquired more land from a neighbouring farmer and created the ‘Back‐9’ which was opened in May 2004. This course was also designed by Stewart Finney and is very different to the original 9‐holes. The front‐9 is open pasture land, the back‐9 has 6,000 trees planted to define the fairways and make it a more challenging course.
Bryn concludes by saying that they found they were also able to cater for the more mature golfer who finds the full length championship courses too long for them. Silver Birch is 3235 yards long overall and is excellent for improving the short game. The Par for the course is a challenging 59.
View from the 7th tee
Benz invented the car… and provided the setting for Back to the Future III. “My grandmother’s family on my mother’s side went to upper New York state, up by Oneida county. The wind comes off the Great Lakes, rises, then drops the snow all over the state and carries on.” “Massachusetts had a hell of a
snowstorm, of course, just before Christmas. And you’d wonder why they got so much snow up in the north‐eastern states, being so close to the sea. Well, that’s why. It’s that freezing wind coming over the lakes.” Before I left them, Bryn told me that the seventh green, which has been around as long as the course, is pointing in the wrong direction, and that he hopes this can be his next major project.
It currently points away from the line of the drive, and Bryn worries that the approach shot to that hole is unusually difficult. “None of us can do backspin that well”, he said.
“I’ve seen a golf course designed on which
they had dug the front of the green down and put a sleeper wall there, left a gap for a mower to lap the apron, then built the green there. I thought that was a lovely idea, but it would take a lot of doing. I suppose we just haven’t got that bored yet.”
And I noticed, as I was walking out of the shed, how many new trees were burgeoning along the fairways. The club is aware of how many of these there soon will be. Bryn seemed to have a laid‐back attitude about such things, which allowed a friendly relationship between his staff and himself. And speaking of tree clearance, he said: “We don’t like to cut down too many, of course. We’ve planted over 6,000 ourselves in the past few years, so it would be self‐ defeating.”
“Anyway, we don’t struggle with it when it does happen. It seems people are always worrying about when and how is best to clear trees. At the end of the day, there’s not much to it. It’s called a chainsaw.”
Ena Wynne MBE and Merfyn Davies
The club’s eco‐friendly clubhouse is now up and running and was officially opened by Mrs Ena Wynne MBE who, twenty‐one years later, performed the ceremony as a lady of ninety years old. She was awarded an MBE for services to her community. She was accompanied by BBC Radio Cymru reporter Merfyn Davies who has been a member of the club since the day it opened.
44 I PC FEBRUARY/MARCH 2018
The new clubhouse
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156
