Careful, sometimes a fence is just a fence

Hard to see the scare near the stone. Clear to see the stone on line with the far fence going up and over the hill.

Paul in PA

Paul in PA, post: 379761, member: 236 wrote: Hard to see the scare near the stone. Clear to see the stone on line with the far fence going up and over the hill.

Paul in PA

If you can zoom in the scar is clear as it cuts through a little ravine

Many times a fence is just a fence. But, when it's more than a fence, it is wonderful.

Holy Cow, post: 379876, member: 50 wrote: Many times a fence is just a fence. But, when it's more than a fence, it is wonderful.

Action to quiet title = wonderful? Are you an attorney?

Blasphemy!!!!!!!!!!!!

When a fence leads you to knowing the true location of a section corner or quarter corner in PLSSia, it is wonderful.

Holy Cow, post: 379887, member: 50 wrote: Blasphemy!!!!!!!!!!!!

When a fence leads you to knowing the true location of a section corner or quarter corner in PLSSia, it is wonderful.

Ahhh, the age old question...Which came first? The fence or the pin?

paden cash, post: 379913, member: 20 wrote: Ahhh, the age old question...Which came first? The fence or the pin?

Yes, the steel t-posts in the fence would be an excellent clue that this is a very, very old fence dating back to the 19th-century. Likewise the unweathered wooden posts. I'd think one could conclude that the stone has obviously been moved. (Not).

Clearly there was a fence running along the section line at one time, for some reason it got shifted west a bit. Now it is not on the section line or the property line, there are imperial entanglements in this area so the property line will remain on the section line and the fence is just a fence.

I don't really care one way or the other, I'm not needing this section line, my interest is 1/2 to the east.

I've seen a number of times where the fence was purposely held back 1 or 2 rods from the section line so a right of way could be established. I've also seen where the right of way was abandoned and one of the fences removed. I always look at the relationship between the section line and the fence line - any evidence to explain what happened.

Somebody once said something like:

Surveyors who blindly accept all fences, are fools.
Surveyors who ignore fences out of hand, are idiots.

All fences mean "something."

Whether or not that "something" is relevant to the survey issue at hand, requires understanding of ALL of the facts, and ALL of the evidence (including the history of the fence).

Just because a fence is OLD doesn't in and of itself prove anything. By the same token, just a fence is NEW, doesn't mean that it isn't important!

So I guess...IT DEPENDS.
:smarty:
Loyal

And fences can be convenient barriers to livestock and nothing more

Kent McMillan, post: 379914, member: 3 wrote: Yes, the steel t-posts in the fence would be an excellent clue that this is a very, very old fence dating back to the 19th-century. Likewise the unweathered wooden posts. I'd think one could conclude that the stone has obviously been moved. (Not).

Thanks Kent for this classic example of a straw man argument.

Kent apparently has never heard of a perpetuated monument. The question is, is it a faithful perpetuation or not?

I found the County Surveyor's redwood hub perpetuation of a quarter section corner in Tulare County 50' east of a brand new fence straight lined between section corners, there is a significant angle point at the quarter. This is in the low arid foothills on the east side of the valley before the real foothills. It is used for dry cattle pasture. It is of fairly low value; I don't know which side built the fence but I'm guessing the owner on the west did fence himself out of property which the neighbor's cattle is grazing on.

Dave Karoly, post: 379946, member: 94 wrote: Thanks Kent for this classic example of a straw man argument.

Kent apparently has never heard of a perpetuated monument. The question is, is it a faithful perpetuation or not?

In my experience, pasture fences are virtually never replaced without leaving a trace either in the form of stubs of rotting posts, rusty strands of buried wire (or wire embedded in trees), the post holes showing where the fence was, and/or (most tellingly) the berm along the old fence line. So if all you have is a modern fence, that is usually evidence of nothing more than that there is a fence there.

Here's a fairly good example from a ranch in South Texas. There's a fence that is probably not much more than thiry or forty years old that has been improved in the last twenty years to add height and net wire.

This is clearly not the same fence described in a 1913 deed. That fence can still be traced from the post holes along it, marked by the PVC laths in the photo. Note that the two-track pasture road parallels the former fence, also.

MightyMoe, post: 379944, member: 700 wrote: And fences can be convenient barriers to livestock and nothing more

Absolutely!

And there are LOTS of those in the West.

Loyal

Fences often get shifted over time, the best places to find old evidence of them seem to be in flow line xings that were "tied down" using rocks and wire.

MightyMoe, post: 379958, member: 700 wrote: Fences often get shifted over time, the best places to find old evidence of them seem to be in flow line xings that were "tied down" using rocks and wire.

I've had very good success locating old post holes. At least in the soil types in Central and South Texas, the holes persist for decades after the post itself was removed. Since post spacings were fairly regular, if you can find one, you can usually find a whole line of them. On one tract in black clay soil, nearly every post hole for a couple of hundred feet had become an ant mound, nicely spaced at 12 ft. (or whatever it was), all on one straight line.

MightyMoe, post: 379958, member: 700 wrote: Fences often get shifted over time, the best places to find old evidence of them seem to be in flow line xings that were "tied down" using rocks and wire.

Agree...GOOD point, and I have found this to be the case many times.

Another suggestion I would add, is following the fence line between Corners with a compass. Often local variation will explain the "wandering" of fence lines between "found" Corners. This is also helpful following (retracing) Section Lines in timber, where the original "blazed line" appears to meander through the trees in a [apparently] strange manner.

I have seen magnetic variation CHANGE in excess of 6å¡ in just 200 feet in the Black Hills, and "wild" variations are common in most Mining Districts.

Loyal

The vast majority of patents issued in our area from Uncle Sam were standard quarter sections. The entrymen had reasons to construct fences along the apparent quarter section lines despite an absence of center corners. Many early settlers planted hedge/osage orange/bois d'arc trees along the apparent boundaries. This is an area of mixed cropland,pastureland and native grass meadows. Fencing was a necessity from the start in most sections.