Members of Killarney Golf Club are to be rallied into action after this week’s storms rendered large sections of both courses unplayable.

Storm Desmond left the first, fourth and 18th holes of the club’s Killeen course, and the 16th, 17th and 18th holes of Mahony’s Point under water which in some areas reaches up to four feet deep.

While Mahony’s Point could be open within two weeks, the Killeen course is likely to be out of action for a prolonged period, with club manager Cormac Flannery suggesting it could reopen by the end of January provided rainfall is low over Christmas.

But despite the damage caused to the course there will be some golf on offer for club members over the Christmas period, Flannery said: “We have conjured up an 18 hole layout across both courses from playable holes.

“Realistically we hope to have it open by Monday - we’ve called it ‘The Ark’. We have a lot of members who live away and will be home visiting around Christmas.”

The golf club experienced similar flooding in 1993 and 2009, and Flannery is confident their members can help make the course fully functional again, he said: “ We are lucky we have a great membership here. We’ll send around an SOS text message and hopefully we will see some volunteers come in.

“Members will think I’m mad but I think we’ve been fairly lucky. Other courses had to rebuild greens after the storms of 2014, which is a €30-40,000 job. We aren’t looking at anything like that.”