Disc golf retrieval etiquette

Question

I was in a group of four when a couple of our players dropped discs into a mucky pond on hole 10. We hugged the side of the pond as I retrieved the discs with a disc retriever.

The other members of my group waved a group of three behind us to play through. Two of their group threw inland and past our group, but the last one threw short and into the pond far beyond easy retrievability. As I was casting the retriever, the rest of my group was tracking their throws so we could get out of the way, if necessary.

As they passed us, one of them yelled at our group that we should have gotten off the fairway, though we were tight on the pond and there wasn't any easy way out of the fairway. He also said our presence caused his friend to throw his disk in the pond. The two other members of the party looked uncomfortable with his behavior. Finally, he added that it shouldn't take four people to retrieve a disk (we didn't want to break our party up).

Even though I was not sure our party was in the wrong, I apologized to avoid escalation. Was our party in the wrong? Should we have written off the disks as lost rather than retrieve them? What is the proper etiquette here for both parties?

For more information, this was hole 10 at Centre Hills Disk Course. In this image, the tee box is on the right, baskets on the left, and our party was hugging the bank of the pond. The stream was too high to be crossable.

Answer 1

The etiquette for this particular course states:

The player further from the basket should throw first. Do not distract other players when they are throwing. Do not throw the disc when others are in the way of your shot. Do not be overly loud or use profanity while on the course. Respect the pedestrians, bikers and all other park users at Centre Hills Park.

While your group may not have been a distraction or in the way of the shots for this group playing through, I can see the case for it. The respect part is self-explanatory.

Personally, it sounds like this person was being difficult, but it wasn't entirely unreasonable though it could've been handled differently.

I would've erred on the side of caution and put the search on hold until they played through. As for where to retreat to, it's hard to tell by the overview shot but after waving them through, I would've found a spot that was reasonably out of the way not hugging the pond.

Judging from the view from the tee, I would've gotten by the barrier (the top of the pic of the overhead view). Perhaps excessive but less deniably out of the way.