Land Survey Question

Mint condition here making the reply. I am not logged in so I will not be seeing your replys. I have a background as a youth in this topic. Do some research before going into the field and make sure that you have permission to enter any land area to avoid trespass problems. The survey method that you are inquiring of is very common, for us here in the Oregon, USA area, we seen the rectangular system instilled as far back as the 1850's. There were three aspects, the notification claim, certificate claim, and later, if you completed the timeframe as established, the Donation land claim which verified that you satisfied all issues associated with the occupation of the parcel. If there are any well defined and established brush lines, those are most likely orignial ownership fence lines. Research is imperative.

While it is true that the magnetic poles do shift, one of the first things that we did was to research deeply into the records of that parcel in question. One of the things that set us back, and often, was what the original surveyor used to mark the land corners with. Damascus steel gun barrels, flat strap iron plain iron pipes, or granite stones. IN the wilderness a quadrangular ditch was used at section corners, and along the 1/4 corners just two of those ditches were dug. Give that a couple hundred years, provided the only traffic was wildlife and time, they can still be found today. Where the acual corner was in the intersection of the ditches were piles of charcoal where the surveyor deposited coals of a hardwood burned specifically to mark the site. That was lighter, certainly cheaper, and more convienient than lugging in a 1 cubic yard granite stone. In the habital areas, though, the corners use the granite stones and other man-made materials. The problem with the granite is that although it is deemed sturdy, it will revert to a limestone given enough time to be totally encapsulated in our soils. This caused some heads to be scratched until we did our research on our soils. THese were usally buried tree feet down, totally coverd and sooner or later, trees would grow over the area and sometimes consume the stone in the root wad. As far as locating the initial bearing. You will need to know original bearing and what was used as a backsite, and secondly, were there any bearing trees, or witness trees marked? What were the species, and are they still there today? Realize that any conifer may have been harvested, and what is the season that the trees were marked? Why is that important to know? If they were conifers, and marked on any side other than the North side of the trunk, they will have sealed comletely over. But, on the North side, it will be slower to heal and so still have a depressed area that may be the site of the original carving. Here is another item that you must know in order to accurately locate those trees. How tall was that surveyor? You see, the trees would have been marked at two locations, one on the flute of the root wad, and the other at the breast height of the individual, commonly known as the DBH, or diameter breast height. I searched all over one area for some trees, and although we located possible trees, it wasn't until we researched the records, clear back to the death records where the height and weight were noted. It was here that we found out this man was a good 6'8", and the tallest man in my crew was 5'8". Doesn't seem like ti would make a difference, but after adjusting our measurements, we found our orignal trees. Where this really made the difference was in the trees that were faced uphill towards the corner. Downhill the blazes, or faces, (marks) were usually located at our height. If you know that height and adjust your search efforts, you will find your marks. Study the soil burms on the uphill side of the trees as well. Has there been any slides or sloughing? Has there been any dozer work that would change the landscape surface? We found a situation where there was a timber trespass and there was a new fenceline established and the contest was on. Only after running line a mile from the South on a located line did we locate the actual conifer stump that had been cut in the harvest of the trespass. This doesn't happen very often, but when we opened it up, we were able to dissect the stump and find the first marks when the tree was only 8" in DBH, and was later marked twice more, each face aligning over the previous mark. Trespass was proven. Iron pipes, if they were used, have long rotted. But, not to dispair if the soils have not been disturbed. Here you begin by locating where the point fell and is supposed to be located. Carefully begin scalping or shaving the soils in a horizontal manner and if you locate rust rings, there is your corner of interest. If you must dig in the soil to locat any wodden stakes, be careful as you near the depth believed to be at the time it was installed, and you will most likely find rotted wood within the area. We have one town that is marked at the street intersections with handblown glass pickle jars.

As for using a compass and chain, good luck. The chain was an actual chain that had specifically designed links and was 66 links and that actually made the entire length 100 feet. Each link was 6.66 inches. No environmental condition were noted until much later upon advent of the flat tape, then stretch was calculated based on temperature alone. So, if you used a 300 foot steel tape, you had a sag or belly in the line. If you pulled too hard, you were not measuring it accurately. So, you used a special finger ring clamp and a graduated pull scale to get the right distance. For the compass, you had to have the declination set, and not have any steel metals nearby the needle. Even the metal ring of some erasers on the end of the wodden pencil would pull the needle off of true or magnetic North, and the bearing would be inaccurately recorded. The most accurate method came from observing the North star with a transit, however, and the transit had a magnetic compass on the face of the plate so that once you observed your star, you could read your magnetic bearing right then and continue on. Cadastral means land, and the township and range is based on one mile squares but the mathematical error was "dumped" in the high mountains or ocean areas, being uninhabital by standards of the era. By "dumped" that was where you would find short sections, and depending on where you landed on the range line based on a baseline usually in a valley area, you will see that the cardinal corners overlap, NW corner being almost a 1/4 mile away from the SW corner of the range to the North. There is another method used in the United States, and that is the triangular method in which the land was measured in pure triangles, used in Ohio and Texas predominantly. By the way, many surveys were made at night when there was no heat waves to distort the line of sight as the heat comes off of the earths mantle. If you are wanting to retrace a line for fencing purposes, be aware that a convience fence can grow hair in time, and become a recognized boundary line. THis must be maintained, used to be, for 7 years and then it could become the new legal line despite what your legal description stated. Spite fences were anoher problem, self explanatory. Finally, be aware of meander lines, and metes and bounds. Meander lines regard the waterway beaches of a river or sreek or annual stream bed whereby they may cnange due to high water flow. This is not controllable and has caused many headaches and land disputes because nature changed the physical features.

Just do your homework first, gather copies of the surveys in the area, from the first to the last, and you will be surpised at the mosaic of lines that can be confusing. Do not dispair, and you will have some fun as well. Good Luck, David L. Clark

Hello, Mint, in case you come back….

Wow! Do you have an ancestor christened, William, who had a friend named Meriwether? What a fine essay...and exactly the kind of info I was seeking. The part about sighting/calibrating on Polaris was especially interesting since I had figured, maybe, one would need to find and refer to some sort of polar migration or magnetic north deviation history in order to translate recorded bearings to (or from) true north bearings. Some of the theodolites I've seen in use appear to be quite sophisticated nowadays. I know that laser is used but, I wonder how present-technology theodolites determine true compass bearings: are they also "calibrated" by star sighting? Perhaps they are able to utilize GPS or something like that? The parts in your reply about triangles, metes and bounds, and locating survey markers using trees have uncanny relevance to the description on one particular deed I've been concerned with. I will post it below, just for fun, so you can see. You can see how old the survey must be since the distance unit, Vara, was used. Another deed description, for land in California, led to some interesting historical findings...apart from the fact that it, too, describes land that was once Spanish/Mexican (but Republic of California instead of Republic of Texas). For example, I discovered that the California parcel was once a Mexican land grant. Also, that the original name of the northern California river today called American River was Rio de los Americanos, or River of the Americans. I kind of like the old name better, but it can be a tongue twister. Finally, before I go, I'd hope you'd have no objection if I posted your essay elsewhere for some fellows I'm sure will find it interesting? But I wanted to ask first. Please? Again, thanks for the reply and for your effort, which is really appreciated. Looks to me like there could be a real story, even a novel, there in all your surveying exploits.

Here's the deed I mentioned above...that some might find interesting how it relates to your post.

All that certain tract of land situated partly in Guess Where County & partly in Guess Who Co., _________, described as....50 Acres out of the Jackson Blevins Survey, Ab. #87, described by metes and bounds as follows: Starting at a point in the East line of the said Blevins Survey, same being the Northeast corner of said Sweatman 200 acre homestead tract, a stake from which a Chittum stump bears North 89-1/2 W 96 vrs; Thence S 30 with the NE line said survey850 vrs. to SE corner of said 200 acres tract and said survey stak from which pecan 10 in brs S 32-1/2 E 119 vrs; Thence S 60W with the SE line of said survey 337 vrs to stake from which a pecan 5in. brs N 50 W 42 vrs a bois d'arc 6 in brs S 88 W 13vrs; Thence N 30 W 850 vrs to stk on NE line of said survey; Thence n 60 E 337 vrs to place of beginning.

what does brs mean?

vrs, abbreviation for varas, plural of vara : linear unit of measure once used (and still appearing) in surveys in Texas (formerly Republic of Texas, province of Mexico, possession of Spain). Old Spanish equivalent of 2.6816 ft (0.8359 mtr). Used loosely in S. American to denote 0.8 to 1.1 meters.

quite likely the word relates to the length of one step within a stride (two steps), when a typically-sized person of the former era (say, a 5-ft, 5-in Spaniard, Texican, or Mexicano) would be counting off steps to measure land distances.

Except for already-existing survey records of Texas, not aware of any other place where the term remains in use for official records keeping purposes.