"Miserly precipitation rates this year are only part of the problem facing Texas golf courses."

John Paul Newport reports on the Texas golf course situation where drought was followed by record heat this summer.

Houston, despite some people's impression of the Texas climate, is a semitropical city that averages about 50 inches of rain annually. This year so far it has received only 12 inches, 5 of which fell in January. More than 15,000 trees in the city's massive Memorial Park, including many lining the golf course there, are visibly dead or dying. (It will cost an estimated $4.5 million to remove them.) At the Tour 18 course north of the city, the hole meant to mimic the 17th at TPC-Sawgrass lacks one essential detail: water in the lake that surrounds the island green.

Miserly precipitation rates this year are only part of the problem facing Texas golf courses. The three-month stretch from June through August was the hottest that any state has experienced since at least 1895, when record-keeping began. Many parts of the state, including the Dallas-Fort Worth area, suffered through 70 days or more of 100-degree-plus weather.