Relief from animal bed in pine needles?

[danthegolfer]

Stroke play competition. Player's ball comes to rest under a pine tree just off the fairway in pine needles. The pine needles have been clearly moved around by a small animal that made a small nest/bed there. Not like a birds nest, but just an indentation where pine needles were pushed aside and minor small amount of soil was moved around to form a little cup where the animal probably slept. Is free relief allowed?

[rogolf]

25 minutes ago, danthegolfer said:

Stroke play competition. Player's ball comes to rest under a pine tree just off the fairway in pine needles. The pine needles have been clearly moved around by a small animal that made a small nest/bed there. Not like a birds nest, but just an indentation where pine needles were pushed aside and minor small amount of soil was moved around to form a little cup where the animal probably slept. Is free relief allowed?

Perhaps, but I'd need to see it rather than depend on a verbal description.

[danthegolfer]

@rogolf Unfortunately wasn't able to grab a picture, but I've attached an image below that is somewhat similar. Differences are there was only 1 hole and it was about 3x wider and didn't extend down into the soil (more like a bed for a small animal than these holes below that look more like squirrel digging holes for storage).

 

I guess the more broad question from a rules perspective is - what defines a "hole"?  If a hole is dug in pine straw as pictured below where just small top layer of dirt is scratched around, is that still a hole that would get free relief?

 

[rogolf]

Maybe you can reach your own conclusion based on the definition of animal hole:

Animal Hole

Any hole dug in the ground by an animal, except for holes dug by animals that are also defined as loose impediments (such as worms or insects).

The term animal hole includes:

• The loose material the animal dug out of the hole,

• Any worn-down track or trail leading into the hole, and

• Any area on the ground pushed up or altered as a result of the animal digging the hole underground.

An animal hole does not include animal footprints that are not part of a worn down track or trail leading into an animal hole.

[st1800e]

1 hour ago, rogolf said:

Any hole dug in the ground

So that would seem to be ground=dirt.  So if only pine straw, that is not ground.  

[danthegolfer]

45 minutes ago, st1800e said:

So that would seem to be ground=dirt.  So if only pine straw, that is not ground.  

 

Agree with that, but what if some dirt is also scraped around? At what depth of dirt scraping would the line drawn between that verses a "hole" in the ground or not?

 

 

[ChaosTheory]

Deleted.

Edited October 15, 2023 by Snowman9000

[davep043]

9 hours ago, danthegolfer said:

 

Agree with that, but what if some dirt is also scraped around? At what depth of dirt scraping would the line drawn between that verses a "hole" in the ground or not?

At some point this has to become a judgement call, the Rules can't define every single situation.  In this case, I'd suggest that you may (mark and) lift the ball to determine if the hole does indeed extend into the ground.  If not, if this is only a depression in some Loose Impediments, I'd say no relief.  Since you mention in your second post...

 

11 hours ago, danthegolfer said:

didn't extend down into the soil

For the specific case, I'd say no relief.

[antip]

On 10/15/2023 at 3:21 PM, danthegolfer said:

 

Agree with that, but what if some dirt is also scraped around? At what depth of dirt scraping would the line drawn between that verses a "hole" in the ground or not?

 

 

"Scraped around" or stuff moved by your sleeping animal is just surface ground moved. That is not an animal hole, which the definition tells us is something an animal has dug.

[CaseyC]

Aren't the pine needles loose impediments and can be moved?

[danthegolfer]

For the sake of the discussion, I've tried to build a cross section of the ground to illustrate the particular scenario. The brown area is the ground,  the orange is the pine straw layer.  The pine straw was clearly moved aside (similar to pictures above) and the area in the dirt had been dug into to create a depression. 

 

I guess the challenging part from a ruling perspective is at what point does the "depression" become a "hole"?  About half my ball was sitting below the ground level.

 

 

 

[rogolf]

14 minutes ago, danthegolfer said:

For the sake of the discussion, I've tried to build a cross section of the ground to illustrate the particular scenario. The brown area is the ground,  the orange is the pine straw layer.  The pine straw was clearly moved aside (similar to pictures above) and the area in the dirt had been dug into to create a depression. 

 

I guess the challenging part from a ruling perspective is at what point does the "depression" become a "hole"?  About half my ball was sitting below the ground level.

 

 

 

And, the next question is when does the depression become an animal hole?

[sui generis]

19 minutes ago, danthegolfer said:

For the sake of the discussion, I've tried to build a cross section of the ground to illustrate the particular scenario. The brown area is the ground,  the orange is the pine straw layer.  The pine straw was clearly moved aside (similar to pictures above) and the area in the dirt had been dug into to create a depression. 

 

I guess the challenging part from a ruling perspective is at what point does the "depression" become a "hole"?  About half my ball was sitting below the ground level.

 

 

 

 

I'm granting free relief mainly because your illustration is very good, but it also suggests a hole. 🙂

[MakersMarsh3]

Don’t think we would see many rules officials not grant relief here

[dmeeksDC]

If the rules do not define a minimum depth to qualify as an animal hole, then any digging of any depth by an animal would qualify in my opinion. Also, the rule says paw prints or tracks do not qualify. Those are not paws or tracks, these are the result of an animal digging. They do not define any minimum depth or look to the hole. The rule is too vague to declare those are not animal holes. 
 

In addition, we should not be destroying animal nests while golfing anyway. 

[Avidswampthing66]

1 hour ago, danthegolfer said:

For the sake of the discussion, I've tried to build a cross section of the ground to illustrate the particular scenario. The brown area is the ground,  the orange is the pine straw layer.  The pine straw was clearly moved aside (similar to pictures above) and the area in the dirt had been dug into to create a depression. 

 

I guess the challenging part from a ruling perspective is at what point does the "depression" become a "hole"?  About half my ball was sitting below the ground level.

 

 

 

IMO this would be considered a hole dug out by an animal.  You take relief.