CLYDE TWP. – With just a couple quick steps, Tom Morgan sent a disc sailing across Jake Simpson Wilderness Park late Friday afternoon.

“Good throw,” Dan Gerstenberger called out.

It was a little chilly, and the ground was muddy. But all 12 holes were installed at Clyde Township’s new disc golf course, which zigzags, looping around the park off Vincent Road, and organizers said they were looking forward to it becoming a new draw for the township. So far, they said they had it up for a couple of weeks.

“We’ve had a lot of people in the park already,” Morgan said. “A lot of good things being said. It’ll only get better, too, as it gets dried up, get some T-pads down.”

Gerstenberger, Clyde’s public works superintendent, stood nearby and added, “Eventually, we’re going to get cement pads here, and then, we’re going to have a big sign here with the whole course layout.”

“So, when people come, they can get an idea,” he said.

Gerstenberger said Morgan approached him with the idea for a disc golf course after he took the DPW reins last summer before taking the idea to Sherry Beiser-Walter, who heads the township’s recreation department.

The township board OK’d spending roughly $3,000 to help install the course late last year.

Gerstenberger and Beiser-Walter said that covered nine of the 12 holes with the total expenditure around $4,000. Luckily, they said they got a lot of help from Morgan, who volunteered to help design and put in the course and whose father’s company, Morgan Excavating, also lent a hand. The company is also the first hole’s sponsor.

Morgan is a native of Clyde Township but currently lives in Port Huron.

He said disc golf was still kind of new and growing in the area, pointing to the existing courses at Columbus County Park, in East China Township, and Holland Woods. On Friday, he came ready — a pack of colorful discs in tow.

There was a putter, a mid-range, a distance driver. Slowly, Morgan thumbed through them.

“Putters are kind of thick — much more like a normal Frisbee. So, they fly a lot slower, a lot more control to them. Basically, as you go up in speed, we call it, they get thinner and wider. That makes the disc fly longer. Ideally,” he said with a chuckle.

The two township officials said they were looking forward to seeing the course busy later this year and hoped to capitalize on the growth with other developments at the park.

Beiser-Walter said they’re applying for grants to connect Jake Simpson park to the nearby township park with a walking path or new play equipment.

Gerstenberger also said pickleball courts are popular in the summer, adding Beiser-Walter was looking at putting in more.

“I mean, from 8 to noon this parking lot’s full,” he said of the park.

Morgan added he hoped to start a disc golf league this summer in Clyde.

“I previously ran a league at Holland Woods. About four or five years ago, we had like 30 people showing up every week,” he said. “So, it was good.”

For those interested in the disc golf course, organizers formed a Facebook page under Jake Simpson Park DGC. Beiser-Walter said they were also selling putters at the township hall for $10.

“That’d be plenty to play the course. That’s all you need,” Morgan said. Beiser-Walter replied, “We’ll probably expand with that more once we get (going).”