Turning the Courses Into Fowl Territory

The influx of Canada geese to Northern California golf courses has forced greenskeepers to seek creative ways to keep them away and, thus, from making a mess of the fairways.

At Shoreline Golf Links in Mountain View, for example, more than 500 geese were counted last month, despite strategically placed statues of coyotes and wolves, a machine that sounds like a goose in distress, and a border collie named Wryn, who herds the birds away from the fairways and greens.

Said course superintendent Steve Crane to the San Jose Mercury News: “They’re going to turn me gray.”

Trivia time: On this date in 1973, Billie Jean King defeated Chris Evert, 6-0, 7-5, in the Wimbledon final. What was significant about that triumph?

Sights and sounds: Maria Sharapova may be something to look at, writes Robert Kitson in London’s Guardian newspaper, but “a walrus giving birth would sound more ladylike than the Russian in full screech mode.”

True romance: Tony Stewart was honored with a display at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway museum, featuring cars he has driven in his career. The two-time Nextel Cup champion was emotional afterward, explaining, “I’ve had girlfriends I haven’t had as good a relationship with as I’ve had with these cars.”

Cheaters on the brain: Peter Schmuck of the Baltimore Sun tuned into the Tour de France the other day, but the recent doping scandal was all he could think about: “I half-expected to see Jose Canseco trundling by on a 10-speed,” he wrote.

Cruel and unusual: The Sun of London reports that the English owner of a racehorse named Ronaldo had the animal gelded because he was angry about the protest by Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo, which might have contributed to England’s Wayne Rooney being sent off with a red card in a match won via penalty kicks by Portugal.

Owner Gary Martin told the Sun he would have achieved “more satisfaction” to have had the soccer player gelded, “but this is the best I could do.”

Sounds about right: College football magazines’ preseason rankings are out and most have USC atop the Pacific 10 Conference (Street & Smith ranks California ahead of USC), UCLA near the middle and Washington at or very near the bottom.

Writes Molly Yanity of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer: “They’ll make you think Dwayne Jarrett is the second coming and that the Huskies already have lost nine games.”

Fun while it lasts: With the Colorado Rockies finally enjoying success, Manager Clint Hurdle told the Denver Post that he no longer has to do his grocery shopping at midnight to avoid being recognized: “Now I can actually go out at 9 or 10 in the morning and grocery shop and say, ‘Hey, how ya doin’?’ It’s been nice to function in your neighborhood a little bit and not have to be more of a night owl.”

Trivia answer: It was the first all-U.S. women’s Wimbledon final.

And finally: From Bernie Lincicome of the Rocky Mountain News: “The Tour de France without Lance Armstrong is like ‘Where’s Waldo’ without Waldo.”