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When your ball is in a bunker, be safe and don’t touch the sand until after you have managed to hit the ball out!

Many times, players will pick up a rake on the way to their ball and as a gesture of etiquette will smooth the sand at the spot where they just picked up the rake. Or, players may inadvertently touch the sand with their club during their backswing. They are both penalties!

There are some exceptions that will allow you to touch the sand while your ball is in that bunker providing nothing is done that constitutes testing the condition of the hazard or improving the lie of the ball:

• As a result of or to prevent falling (you slip going down a steep bunker face),
• In removing an obstruction (rake, cigarette butt, etc),
• In measuring (moving your ball over one or two putter heads if your ball interferes with someone else),
• In retrieving, lifting, placing or replacing a ball under any Rule (ball deemed unplayable or someone played your ball by mistake), or
• In placing your clubs in the bunker (you select one of the three clubs you carried into the bunker to hit the shot and toss the other two in the bunker behind you)

And if you make a stroke at your ball in a bunker and don’t manage to get it out, you are allowed to rake that spot that you just played from provided your ball doesn’t come back to the same place if you don’t get out of the bunker. If there’s any chance that it may hit the lip and come back to that spot, play it safe and wait to rake until you’re all the way out of the bunker!

Rule 13-4 Ball in Hazard; Prohibited Actions
Except as provided in the Rules, before making a stroke at a ball that is in a hazard (whether a bunker or a water hazard) or that, having been lifted from a hazard, may be dropped or placed in the hazard, the player must not:
(a) Test the condition of the hazard or any similar hazard;(b) Touch the ground in the hazard or water in the water hazard with his hand or a club; or(c) Touch or move a loose impediment lying in or touching the hazard.

Exceptions:
1. Provided nothing is done that constitutes testing the condition of the hazard or improves the lie of the ball, there is no penalty if the player (a) touches the ground in any hazard or water in a water hazard as a result of or to prevent falling, in removing an obstruction, in measuring or in retrieving, lifting, placing or replacing a ball under any Rule or (b) places his clubs in a hazard 2. After making the stroke, the player or his caddie may smooth sand or soil in the hazard, provided that, if the ball is still in the hazard or has been lifted from the hazard and may be dropped or placed in the hazard, nothing is done that improves the lie of the ball or assists the player in his subsequent play of the hole. Note: At any time, including at address or in the backward movement for the stroke, the player may touch with a club or otherwise any obstruction, any construction declared by the Committee to be an integral part of the course or any grass, bush, tree or other growing thing.

PENALTY FOR BREACH OF RULE:
Match play -- Loss of hole; Stroke play -- Two strokes.
(Searching for ball — see Rule 12-1.)
(Relief for ball in water hazard — see Rule 26.)