Around my parts I've found a number of corner accessories, specifically a mag nail in a wood fence post, railroad tie, etc.?ÿ Sometimes the nail is sticking halfway out of the post.?ÿ Something I've been wondering is if surveyors are running around pounding nails only halfway into these posts??ÿ Or is weathering causing them to work their way out??ÿ Or is there some other explanation?
I already note the distance above the adjacent grade for nail accessories I set this way but I'm starting to think I should note the nail is flush with the post as well.?ÿ If the nail is going to work loose over time and fall out I'd rather have the next surveyor know they can tap it back flush to preserve it.
Decades ago when I set cup tacks in wooden stakes I left the tack proud so it would be apparent that it hadn??t been disturbed. I don??t think a nail works it??s way out.
I've returned to corners and found previously flush nails barely stuck on posts. I started using 5 or 6 inch mag hubs with whiskers. Those also work well in bearing trees. Use judgement in logging areas...
Some who work alone leave the nail out far enough to hook the end of a common steel tape over it and pull it tight to the monument being referenced.
The post will move over time far more than the nail might move relative to the post.
I know a fellow who will pull them out completely if he thinks he owns the post, tree, whatever has been used.
@holy-cow There was a US Mineral Surveyor (J.H. Winwood 1975-1952) whole routinely drove a nail in the 'X' on his Bearing Trees. He was pretty active in Utah during the early 1900s, and I loved retracing his surveys. He was an excellent "measurer" and always monumented very well. Most of the BT blazes have grown over, but you can run a metal detector up and down the tree, and it will sing when it passes the old buried nail! On Juniper Trees the blaze is often still open to some extent, and you can the see 'X" and the (usually) bent nail. I have always figured that he bent them for the purpose you stated above.
Loyal
On living trees the tree will heal and cover a nail, spike, etc. with bark in a few decades. In the forested West healthy trees of the right age (fairly young) bearing trees were selected in four quadrants around a corner monument, blazed open and scribed with info.?ÿ If only young ones were available just a small blaze at the base was scribed "BT".?ÿ If done right with minimal damage to the tree it could grow until its natural death (over a hundred years for typical species) and excision of the bark at fairly obvious well healed scar shapes (called ******s) to reveal the pristine scribing in the heartwood.?ÿ Even when it fell and was just a stump, if left undisturbed careful forensic examination of wood shards and bark nearby would reveal the scribe marks decades later.
In my USFS & BLM career I've scribed maybe a hundred BTs and recovered hundreds more.?ÿ Here's the short course concerning making one:
- Select the right healthy tree, 20-100' away from the corner depending on conditions.?ÿ
- ?ÿBlaze it correctly with a sharp hand axe, cutting at a shallow angle from above until you hit heartwood.?ÿ It's almost like shaving your face and hurts the tree the least.?ÿ
- Use a very sharp scribe to incise the numbers in the heartwood without chewing it up.
- When done make an angled upward axe cut at the bottom of the blaze as a drainage channel to keep it dry when it rains, dews, etc. so the tree can heal properly.
Rest assured it took a season or so before the the party chief allowed me to do bearing trees unsupervised, some major training there. I'll end with some alarming trends I've seen recently (in the last few decades):
- ?ÿFolks that are setting line with a tree hack here and there and don't know the BLM standards as to how mark a line tree properly, or not mark it.
- Folks that spray orange paint or God forbid herbicide/biocide into the blaze which prevents it from healing naturally.
- Folks who GPS from Mon to Mon and declare it lost without looking for evidence along the line for blazes which clearly define the locus of the original intent.
But that's just me and the opposite can be proven.
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Some scribing and side center nails in these videos.?ÿ
Bark Scribed alder in this one
Back in my hometown area corner accessories were often two nails driven part way in to a post and then bent over to make an X.?ÿ I've seen that in other places as well. More recently shiners have been used.
When using a cut tape or add tape the head of the spike is left offset from the post to make the head more accessible to the foot mark or graduated hundredth mark. I've considered the law requiring reference ties outdated for some time but it is what it is. (not that standard practice actually does the work required to measure ties to the nearest one hundredth. Plus there's always the argument of what constitutes a durable physical object relative with the measurement requirement.)?ÿ
The certificate shall contain at least three reference ties, measured to the nearest
one-hundredth of a foot from the corner to durable physical objects near the corner, which
are located so that the intersection of any two of the ties will yield a strong corner position
recovery.?ÿ
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On living trees the tree will heal and cover a nail, spike, etc. with bark in a few decades. In the forested West healthy trees of the right age (fairly young) bearing trees were selected in four quadrants around a corner monument, blazed open and scribed with info.?ÿ If only young ones were available just a small blaze at the base was scribed "BT".?ÿ If done right with minimal damage to the tree it could grow until its natural death (over a hundred years for typical species) and excision of the bark at fairly obvious well healed scar shapes (called ******s) to reveal the pristine scribing in the heartwood.?ÿ Even when it fell and was just a stump, if left undisturbed careful forensic examination of wood shards and bark nearby would reveal the scribe marks decades later.
In my USFS & BLM career I've scribed maybe a hundred BTs and recovered hundreds more.?ÿ Here's the short course concerning making one:
- Select the right healthy tree, 20-100' away from the corner depending on conditions.?ÿ
- ?ÿBlaze it correctly with a sharp hand axe, cutting at a shallow angle from above until you hit heartwood.?ÿ It's almost like shaving your face and hurts the tree the least.?ÿ
- Use a very sharp scribe to incise the numbers in the heartwood without chewing it up.
- When done make an angled upward axe cut at the bottom of the blaze as a drainage channel to keep it dry when it rains, dews, etc. so the tree can heal properly.
Rest assured it took a season or so before the the party chief allowed me to do bearing trees unsupervised, some major training there. I'll end with some alarming trends I've seen recently (in the last few decades):
- ?ÿFolks that are setting line with a tree hack here and there and don't know the BLM standards as to how mark a line tree properly, or not mark it.
- Folks that spray orange paint or God forbid herbicide/biocide into the blaze which prevents it from healing naturally.
- Folks who GPS from Mon to Mon and declare it lost without looking for evidence along the line for blazes which clearly define the locus of the original intent.
But that's just me and the opposite can be proven.
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Having surveyed, marked, and posted hundreds of miles of USFS boundaries here in Montana, every contract specification from the COR (contracting officer's representative) states that all bearing tree blazes and line hacks/blazes are to be painted red. The ONLY time you are allowed to NOT paint a line hack/blaze is if the adjoining land owner requests no paint, and then that is ONLY on that landowner's side of the line. Contract specifications are also very clear on face hacks/blazes go on the private side of the line and quarter-face hacks/blazes go on the FS side of the line. The person inspecting the line will make you go back and "correct" any deficiancy.
the COR (contracting officer's representative) states that all bearing tree blazes and line hacks/blazes are to be painted red
My perspective is outdated in that I was active in the USFS & BLM in the seventies; though I clearly recall we did not paint blazes as that would have involved carrying additional luggage and be messy.
I poked around several arborist's sites and the consensus is: ?ÿ"By painting wound sealers over the cut or damaged portion of the tree, we are hindering the process for that wound tissue to develop. Plus, we may be sealing rot organisms against the open wound."?ÿ ?ÿSo it would appear the COR(s) you mention are misinformed and shooting from the hip.
Some who work alone leave the nail out far enough to hook the end of a common steel tape over it and pull it tight to the monument being referenced.
I didn't work alone (they knew better) when doing this but it was easier to hook the tape on if it wasn't flush.
@mike-marks Misinformed? Shooting from the hip? Those have been forest service specs in Forest Service Region 1 since at least the late 90s, if not longer. I've visited plenty of bearing trees that I personally blazed and painted years after the fact, only to find the tree healthy and the blaze scarred in, just like you would expect.
@mike-marks Misinformed? Shooting from the hip? Those have been forest service specs in Forest Service Region 1 since at least the late 90s, if not longer. I've visited plenty of bearing trees that I personally blazed and painted years after the fact, only to find the tree healthy and the blaze scarred in, just like you would expect.
I don't doubt Region 1 requires it.?ÿ Only trying to point out it wasn't common in the seventies to paint blazes and there's arborist's reasons not to do so.?ÿ Maybe Region 1 has been wrong since the '90s. That some trees that you revisited did well years later does not prove painting them is harmless over decades statistically.?ÿ
Other jurisdictions allow no painting, State Parks & Refuges, National Parks & Monuments, and USFS Wilderness areas.?ÿ I got popped doing a GPS levelling project spanning 50 miles of a State Park and set brass disks in bedrock with copious orange spray paint so other crews could find them quickly.?ÿ Lo, the Rangers quickly detected it and demanded we remove all paint or pay damages based on what their forces would cost them to do so.?ÿ Um, after penciling it out our crews spent a week with wire brushes, solvent and shop rags to clean it up ???®.?ÿ Really cut into the bottom line.
I'm not being argumentative, just trying to present a different perspective.?ÿ Here's a perspective:?ÿ If forest visitors are strictly restricted to leave no trace maybe surveyors should honor the same philosophy and set monuments, accessory BTs & line trees without painting up the forest with unnecessary manmade colors.
The tree species plays a big factor. It is really hard to kill a Fir unless you top it. And you can cut a maple to the stump and have a bush in a year but if you look at an alder for too long... It's dead????
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