You hit a long ball which seems to just hang in the air before finally dropping into a green-side bunker. When you arrive you can’t see the ball. You think it might be buried or it might be under some of the leaves in the bunker.
What would you do?
A. You would use your club to brush away the leaves and dig holes in the sand, trying to find your ball. Once found you would replace it and re-cover it so that you could barely see a part of the ball. Then you would hit it.
B. Your ball is lost. You would take a one stroke penalty and hit from where you hit before.
A is correct.
You are allowed to use your hands, your club, anything to find your ball. If you uncover it too much, that’s okay. Just replace the sand and leaves so that you can barely see a part of the ball.
Open your Rules of Golf book to:
Rule #12 Searching for and Identifying Ball.
12-1 Searching for Ball;
In a hazard, if a ball is believed to be covered by loose impediments or sand, the player may remove by probing or raking with a club or otherwise, as many loose impediments or as much sand as will enable him to see a part of the ball. If an excess is removed, there is no penalty and the ball must be re-covered so that only a part of the ball is visible.
REMEMBER: If you can’t find your ball in a hazard you can do almost anything to find it as long as you replace it and cover it back up before hitting it.
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