Kent

Sounds like the Waggoner Ranch near Vernon, Tx. If that's the one, I think the family has been fighting and trying to liquidate portions of the land for years. I guess they finally reached an agreement.

It would indeed be a blast to work on something that size. I bet a lot of it has been pretty well surveyed over the years, though.

That's the one listed in the paper. The largest contiguous private property in the U.S. is what it said. I wonder what size the plat would be at a 1"=100' scale would be? I'm sure that whatever scale it was drawn to it would require LOTS of insets and details.

Andy

a little bit of math..

and I come up with almost 800 sq. miles...maybe 28 miles square (and it's probably NOT square). That is maybe larger than some of the counties in Texas.

I hope the buyer was someone with U.S. citizenship. If not, some Saudi prince that has watched westerns his whole life might have one helluva dude ranch.

> I saw in the paper this morning that a ranch in north Texas was being sold. 510,000 acres for $725 million.

I'll bet that the minerals aren't for sale, just the surface estate. Here's a schematic map of the ranch showing that it appears to be land out of just a handful of blocks of surveys (blocks of original land grants).

[Edit: I take it back, about 41% of the minerals will convey with the land according to the listing]

a little bit of math..

I read somewhere that it contains over 1,000 producing oils wells, and that its boundary has been surveyed by the U.S. Government. Wonder how that works?

Probably the 41% that isn't already producing/leased. That would be really nice piece of land to own. I bet the land/ranch manager makes a nice salary.

Perhaps you could have a go at pegging out Anna Creek station in South Australia.
6,000,000 acres (9400 sq.m.) - larger than New Hampshire.
Should get a good fee for that!

Land Between the Lakes is about 170,000 acres, and it's huge. It's hard for me to wrap my head about a tract 3 times that size.

Andy

"Seriously, I think it would be great to work on a project THAT large."

Not me, I worked on the boundary survey for what is now called Palm Coast Fl. That was only 115,000+- acres. Miles and miles of R/W retracment, (I-95, US 1, A1A, Intracostal Waterway and five or six dozen county roads) and monumentation of the Florida Costal Construction Setback Line in St.John's and Flagler county's.

I get a headache just thinking about it! 😉

PS going to Daytona in July? B-)

I'm having a problem with their use of the word "contiguous" based on this map. There is at least one island outside of the main clump. I wonder what rights of access and such go to the owners in the interior islands shown.

Now Imagine staking line around it every 300' with a fence post, then imagine it all fenced, actually cause it's all in a nice "square" parcel it wouldn't be so bad;-)

Waggoner Ranch

I did some survey work on the ranch about 6 or 7 years ago. Cool place. I met one of their managers who was also a private game warden as I recall. He was packing a sidearm and had a shotgun in the truck. He warned me about feral hogs and littering on his ranch. A soil boring company left some empty concrete sacks at the site and I went out of my way to carry them out with me. Fun project until I sank my vehicle in the mud after a particularly heavy rain event.

Not this year

We are in the month or so of building a new house. The LAST one. All one level, all 3' doors, lots of open space. They call it an "Age in Place" home. The older I get the less I like stairs.

Andy

Do they still do the mustering on those stations on horseback?

Do any of the 6 counties involved lie completely within the ranch?

Waggoner Ranch

> I did some survey work on the ranch about 6 or 7 years ago. Cool place. I met one of their managers who was also a private game warden as I recall. He was packing a sidearm and had a shotgun in the truck. He warned me about feral hogs and littering on his ranch. A soil boring company left some empty concrete sacks at the site and I went out of my way to carry them out with me. Fun project until I sank my vehicle in the mud after a particularly heavy rain event.

Sounds familiar.

> Do any of the 6 counties involved lie completely within the ranch?

I don't think so. It looks as if most of the ranch is in Wilbarger County, but Wilbarger is larger than the ranch.

Thirsty country!
Get a feel here:-
(Short 1min 30sec)
Anna Creek

We have the closing scheduled for June 1, if we get you the signed contract tomorrow can you have the completed survey to us by the 27th so our attorneys can review it?