Golf is full of weird, quirky and downright nonsensical rules that golfers can spend an entire lifetime playing without ever encountering.
Some are helpful, like the autumn golf rule that could actually save you strokes when playing in thick foliage, while others can punish you for something as trivial as putting a water bottle down on the green.
One particular rule that came up in our research, however, might be the most insane of all. So ridiculous in fact, that it transcends golf altogether. And it concerns fruit.
The rule in question pertains to the apparently once common occurrence of a golf ball becoming lodged – or is that plugged? – in a piece of orange on the ground.
Yes, you read that right, an orange.
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While one would naturally assume – and this is an approach we would also encourage in casual play – that the done thing in golf would be to simply remove one’s ball from said orange, give it a rinse off (or maybe not given a sticky ball might have more check on the greens) and go about your day, what you likely don’t know is that this is actually against USGA Rules.
In particular, it falls afoul of USGA decision 23/10, which goes as follows:
“If your ball is lodged in an orange, you cannot take relief without penalty.”
Effectively, fruit on the course is treated as any other natural impediment. If you can play it as it lies, do so. Otherwise, declaring an unplayable lie generates the same result as it always will.
Exactly which golf courses are so littered with fruit on the ground that this forms a genuine risk is beyond our ability to research. But should you find yourself on a track near an orchard in the not-too-distant future, well, you can’t say you haven’t been warned.
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