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Realisation (Public)

OAKS Prague – semi-natural green spaces in the golf course

Although the Nebřenice golf course is situated among woods, meadows and bodies of water, emphasis has been placed, since the very beginning, on creating high-quality semi-natural green spaces. These are composed of trees of different sizes, shrubs, and various grass species combined with herbaceous species.

Woody plants

The golf course design relies solely on native plant species suitable for the given habitat. This means that the species composition matches the habitat in terms of soil, water and climate needs. This particular area of the Central Bohemian Region is home to oak-hornbeam forests, with oak, hornbeam, maple and lime as the main woody species, complemented with a number of other species.

The aim is for the composition to look natural, avoiding any artificial-looking plantations. This is why an irregular planting pattern has been chosen to imitate the appearance of thickets, which work as dividing elements in the landscape and create natural enclaves and boundaries for animal species. These plantations make up the pattern of the site’s full-grown greenery and visually separate the golf greens. The whole golf course, along with the varied surrounding landscape, is a mosaic of turf areas, meadows, shrubs, trees, forests and water bodies.

Some of the woody plants are used as solitaires which, in most cases, mark important spots such as greens and path intersections, or simply serve as a backdrop. Woody plants also include shrubs which are planted in large numbers in the more natural areas and on forest edges. One of the functions of the plantations is that of wildlife corridors crossing the golf course.

Altogether, over 1600 woody plants representing 35 species will be planted in the golf course. 7 plant sizes will be used: shrubs 60-80, small trees 125-150 and full-grown trees with trunk diameters between 10-12 and 30-35 cm.

Grass and herbs

Several types of grass and herb seeding mixtures are used for the course. Intensively maintained fairways and greens are sown exclusively with grass mixtures, while mixtures for areas on the sides of the fairways contain herb seeds to add a flowering aspect to the surfaces. These areas are cut less often and provide shelter for animal species in the central part of the course. It is worth mentioning that hydroseeding is used nowadays as the prevailing method for sowing such vast areas. Hydroseeding makes it possible to seed the areas evenly and in a relatively short time. The suspension applied in this manner contains components that hold the seeds in place even on extreme slopes (e.g. bunker edges in this case) and, together with the added fertiliser, help start the seeds.