I think the Official Field Notes are really a narrative record of survey. They aren't really field notes.
If a Surveyor did a good job and made an accurate Record of Survey map then you don't really need the field notes.
The official field notes are in the form that is suggested in the Manual and are taken from all the field information that is learned, gathered, chained, written in books and the BLM land surveyor in charge will take all that information and transcribe it into the official field notes as shown in the Manual. The field notes thus are of the true line even though that true line has not been run on the ground in most cases.
When I was in the field, I also kept my own book with information that I would need later when preparing my final field notes and obviously, sometimes my description of a corner monument may not be the same as my "chairman". His notes were along the random line that we were running on the ground.
Obviously, there have been errors made and hopefully have been caught before the official record was approved and the system of running lines on the ground has been the same for many years.
However, I cannot talk about the methods now on the ground by the BLM crews as I have no idea how they run line now.
And for the most part, I don't care! My concern is what they do with the information learned and how to deal with it.
Sort of like those who can measure to the knats rear end and then don't know what to do with that information.
Keith
So the "official" field notes are opinion rather than fact in the government surveys. I had not caught that before; very interesting.
I had it pounded into me in college that ORIGINAL records of raw data (lab books, field notes, log books, etc.) were sacrosanct in scientific fields, and that would include surveying and engineering. You lined through errors and never erased, and that was the real data. I'm disappointed, disapproving, but not terribly surprised at what the gov't decided to do.
Say what?
I sure don't understand?