History of the Site

The ground occupied by Pollok Golf Club has been inhabited since pre historic times. Located in a copse between the seventh and eighth fairways there is an Iron Age burial mound in which a cremation urn was found during excavations in 1863. There is Roman history in the area. Glasgow was the northern outpost of the Roman Empire and Antonine's Wall is less than ten miles to the north on the other side of the Clyde. There is a Roman marching camp a mile to the north in Pollok Country Park and another larger camp in Queens Park about two miles to the northeast. There is a visible pattern of very straight ancient roads crossing the golf course. These cannot be identified on any available old Ordnance Survey plans or old maps of the estate. One in particular runs in a near straight line from the clubhouse, down the eighteenth and seventeenth fairways, across the sixteenth and fourth fairways, eventually leaving the course at its west end. This was probably an old late mediaeval road but it is a romantic thought that its origins may have been in a Roman road.

After the Dark Ages the history of the site can be picked up through its connection with the Maxwell family of Pollok. The Maxwell family came into possession of most of the lands in the area in around 1270 and have been the owners of the site of the golf course since that time. The current owner, Donald Maxwell MacDonald is the Honorary President of the club. Their seat was a succession of three castles situated on or close to the river somewhere close to the existing Pollok House but the locations of the castles has been lost to local knowledge. Around 1740 the Maxwells consulted with the renowned architect William Adam in the design of Pollok House, a four storey neo classical mansion house in the Scottish style. Work began in 1747 and finished in 1752, four years after the architect's death and was supervised by his equally famous sons John and Robert. The House is located on the north bank of the Cart opposite the fifteenth green and provides the Club with one of its most memorable signature holes. In 1966 the house was handed over to the then Glasgow Corporation and it is now administered as a museum by the National Trust for Scotland on behalf of Glasgow City Council.

An important historical feature on the site is the remains of the Glasgow -Paisley-Ardrossan Canal that was built around 1808 by the Eglinton Family to link their interests in Glasgow and Ardrossan. Construction only reached Paisley before the project was overtaken by the development of the railway network. In fact much of the railway to Paisley runs over the old canal, the only legacy being Canal Street in Paisley. Part of a side branch of the canal has been preserved in the site of the former Ferguslie Mills in Paisley. However the only remaining section of identifiable walls and channel for the main canal are on Pollok golf course where they cross from the river in front of the fifteenth tee and extend to the ninth tee. At that point the walls are clearly visible but the channel is heavily silted up. Elsewhere on the course the canal is merely a wide grassed over ditch but the masonry of the top of the wall is sometimes visible where in the past the surface was scalped by trailed gang mowers.

Other historical structures on the site include two masonry 'cart washes' dating possibly from the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century and two masonry bridges over the canal. These bridges post date the demise of the canal and only have spans that are sufficient to cross the open drainage ditch that the canal became after it was abandoned.

Since mediaeval times the land had been used for agriculture and there are faint remains of the old ridge and furrow ploughing. After the construction of Pollok House the land was put over to use as a park, presumably for grazing and for timber production in the form of copses. During the last war a number of the fairways along the riverside were put to the plough and the turf on these fairways retains a subtle difference from the others. The course was laid out in 1893 and other than a number of changes in layout it continues to occupy the site to the extent that it did then.

Topography

The course lies on the south bank of the White Cart Water, a tributary of the Clyde. The clubhouse is built on a low drumlin at the eastmost end of the site and overlooks the first and eighteenth fairways, which are the only two holes that have any significant change in level between tee and green. The majority of the remainder of the golf course is situated on the ancient flood plain of the White Cart Water and is predominantly flat in character. The course remains a designated flood plain and the Club is not permitted to construct any flood protection works. The Cart is a very fast rising and falling river and at times of heavy rainfall its level can vary by up to almost ten feet in 24 hours. As a result, on average of about every two years, several holes at the west end of the course can be inundated to a depth of several feet. However this flooding of the course greatly reduces the occurrence of flooding in a number of nearby housing estates and is a small price to pay for the near unique ground conditions of the flood plain.

On occasion the periodic flooding deposits quantities of rich silt and over the millennia this silt has built up to a substantial depth. There is no readily available core evidence as to the depth of the resultant loam but greenkeeper's workings have indicated that you are still digging through it at depths of over five feet. It is very free draining and unless an individual flood has deposited an exceptional amount of silt, the course becomes playable as soon as the surface water has dispersed. These conditions differ from the ground on which the two adjoining golf courses have been built and in times of heavy rain Pollok will remain playable when its neighbours are waterlogged.

The rich free draining loam soil produces lush fairways and equally lush rough. The course is a classic parkland track with deciduous copses and scattered individual mature trees. There is a wide range of animal life including fox badger and roe deer. There is also a particularly varied range of bird life. The various species that have been identified are listed in the annexe.

Bird life

The following have been sighted on Pollok Golf Course

Goldcrest, Wren, Coal Tit, Blue Tit, Great Tit, Long Tailed Tit, Sand Martin, Swallow, Swift, Treecreeper, Robin, House Sparrow, Green Finch, Gold Finch, Chaffinch, Starling, Redwing, Pied (great spotted) Woodpecker, Green Woodpecker, Collared Dove, Feral Pigeon, Wood Pigeon, Blackbird,
Fieldfare, Mistle Thrush, Song Thrush, Sparrowhak, Kestrel, Buzzard (vagrant),
Red Kite (vagrant), Jackdaw, Carrion Crow, Rook, Hooded Crow (recent vagrant), Magpie, Lesser Black Backed Gull, Herring Gull, Black Headed Gull, Mallard, Goosander, Dabchick (rare visitor), Canada Geese (overflying), Greylag Geese (overflying), Mute Swan (rare visitor), Whooper Swans (overflying),
Heron, Cormorant, Kingfisher, Pied Wagtail

Mammals

The following is a list of resident mammals.

Roe Deer, Badger, Fox, Stoat, Mole, Various voles, Various mice, Very few rabbits

Naturally occurring and historically introduced trees (excluding recent planting of non native species)

Oak, Ash, Elm (almost wiped out by Dutch Elm Disease but several immature individuals have survived), Chestnut, Sycamore, Lime, Beech, Copper Beech, Hawthorn, Rowan, Alder