Rustic Canyon remains a 14 hole course for at least a few months.
I've never rated the course condition as highly as just now.
What's left is just immaculate, almost flawless.

Even from the relatively small amount of rain we got a week ago, Rustic has lost the short fairway on 7 again. #7 is again playing as a 100yd par 3 for the next 6 to 8 weeks at least. RC also has mud in most of the bunkers along the water outflow flats. The #7 fairway is being scraped and reseeded, the mud is quickly being removed. The bunkers on #10 right and #11 left are now in poor condition and will need new sand.

Other than that, the course is actually in much better playing condition than I can remember in quite some time. The greens are being hardened and it seems there is much less watering being done on the green aprons. Now you just can not fly the ball to the middle of the greens and when putting you can really feel the green contours again. That's great! That's how this course is supposed to play.

No, it's not one of the best, it's THE best in Ventura Country, public or private. No, not the best conditioned, not the fanciest, not the most exclusive, not the most expensive, just the best designed and executed.

Rustic Canyon is a well run course with good staff and good maintenance crew too.

It could be an even better play if it were dried out a bit though.
Harder and faster is better at Rustic Canyon.

Good condition? Nope. Greens are horribly bumpy and thatchy.
The mature trees all around the course are very pretty right now though. Tree rating: 8, Course Rating: 3.5

Pretty wide and surprisingly easy course, 7100y from the "Nicklaus" tees.

I was surprised at how playable it is. I was expecting more vertical holes. There are almost none. Just a little bit of up and down. The wind can blow pretty well on the course too. There are some pretty good holes with some visual interest, a sunken green on a short par 5 with an 80y bunker on the right is well done.

Good greens though running pretty slow for how low cut they are, very nice fairways, a need to play a couple of times before understanding the lines of play, not too crowded.

I think that the cartpaths are completely unnecessary. The underlying soil of the whole place is a lot like decomposed granite. It would have been a lot nicer I think if the cartpaths were simply groomed out of the soils.

There are a lot of what seem to be specifically planted prickly pear cactus. It's odd because the area outside the course doesn't seem to have much of it.

It's hard to determine what is "environmentally sensitive" out there. You can walk all you want on the wash area outside the course, but sorry, no getting your miss hit balls from the exact same type of areas inside the course property.

I have to agree with the Surveyor report: "This is a “great little” golf course."

You do have to hit iron from a lot of tees and shape your tee shots mostly right to left too.

Some pretty hilly holes.

DeBell is soggy in several places though surprisingly pretty good condition.

The new #7 short fairway is supposed to reopen May 1. The new #10 cross bunker adds a good visual to what I thought was the weakest hole on the course. There's new sand in the bunkers of most holes.

All of the greens should be about fully recovered from aeration by next month.
The greens play OK to pretty well now, still a bit bumpy 'n' jumpy putting though.

The administration, staff and greenskeepers to a great job there. Cheers to Jeff Hicks and all of the others involved.

I feel like I should be telling you to stay away instead but May and June are going to be great months to play at Rustic Canyon.

Weather was perfect. The course itself was very poor shape except for the greens which are in wonderful shape. As good as Rustic Canyon greens, but softer. The greens were taking all sorts of shots. The greens are so soft that balls are spinning back off the putting surface. It's actually probably too soft. On 16, footprints are interfering with ball lines. All in all, it's not much of a course, but the greens when fresh cut are really good. Balls are rolling true, greens were probably 10-12 on stimp. These are the best greens I've ever seen on LA Muni courses, though I don't play them often. A real "well done" to the greenskeepers. Now if the fairway keepers and teebox keepers could work at the same level, it'd be a all-around pleasure to play there. Until then...

Rustic is getting healthy again. It's playing much better than 7-8 weeks ago.

The fairways don't seem to have the fungus they had awhile ago, the greens are recovering from aeration, everything seems in very good shape.

Greens are still a bit slower and softer than they should be, but with this weather it should be pretty darn quick by Friday.

Very nice day and place. Even the count of ballmarks on the greens is down.

Started on the back 9 for the first time while crews worked on the front for the morning, walked in 4:15 in a foursome.

Very good job by the greenskeeper and staff.

Rustic is getting too much play. The greens are wearing down, the fairways are not nearly as good as they used to be in the first 6 months after opening. Still a very nice to outstanding course, just not as immaculate anymore. It's a pity the pace of play is quite poor. I'm not quite sure what causes it. Lack of marshalls? Poor players? I played in a twosome behind a foursome at 8:40 (the other 2some bailed after the first hole, some emergency or another), the 4some in front of us after hole 6 had an open hole and needed to be hurried along. After we finally got by them, it was much more pleasant. Still finished in 4:30-4:35 which is too slow for this course.

The greens need time to recover from way too many ballmarks. The greens are reasonably fast and could be very good but for wear from careless players, slope and pin placements. The placements are sometimes far too close to the green edges. #6 and #12 are sometimes just silly. Sterling is very good about giving each player a very nice ballmark fixer tool, but it seems very few people use them. I wish that the starters would ask players to fix their own ballmarks as each group starts and occasionally ask during play.

The blue tees are getting considerable play and wear. The blacks are very good to immaculate.

I walked in about 2:30pm as a single and played right away with another 2some, later joined by another single at #3. I walked (they rode) the front 9 with them in about 2.5 hours. I fixed about 5 severe ballmarks on each green. I diverted back to walk and play the front nine again, this time from the blacks (1.5 hours 2 balls) and had to repair about 3 more new ballmarks on each green.

It's a better course from the blacks.

Nice course on an immense amount of land.
Good visuals on several holes.
Good walking course.

Started 1:00 with no one around. Rather windy though in the afternoon.

Very soft greens. So soft that footprints disturb the ball line. Very few flat spots on the greens with very fair, dense grass all around. Fairways are in very good shape. Some holes really require some knowledge before play.

Several blind shots, some constricted fairways aren't possible to see.

We paid $15 for a replay and got in another 9. We played "til the cows came home" or at least mooed for their dinner. We could hear them clearly on the nearby cattle ranch.

I'd pay and play it more were it not so far for me. Nice place for a jaunt or a combination stay in Santa Ynez with some other activity like wine/bike/hike.