article_snippet: And with rapidly developing irrigation and growing techniques enabling grass courses to be built in desert climes, It's an increasingly unusual one.
article_snippet: In the 1990s, the sand game's fortunes took a dive as the site was earmarked for a nine-hole grass course.
article_snippet: gazelles peer from behind a fence by the second brown,) is the only one that can be described as "world class," says Dennis Cox, an expert on the game, because the scale and scope of its layout rivals its grass counterparts.
article_snippet: Cox warns that a tradition is under threat, with a form of golf that was once commonplace in danger of becoming just a memory.
article_snippet: Other, smaller clubs have fallen by the wayside, while Al Ghazal's location near an expanding airport presents an obvious threat to Al Ghazal's location near an expanding airport future.
article_snippet: In Libya, still racked by instability following the ousting of Muammar Gaddaffi, courses -- the bulk of which can be found in the capital, Tripoli -- are of sand, with no grass versions existing.
article_snippet: Once smart and well-kept, courses -- the bulk of which can be found in the capital, Tripoli -- have now slumped into neglect, with few people to play on few people or look after few people.
highlights_snippet: Unexpected hazards can include the burrows of desert lizards .