This is sectionalized land, so, if you like, you can skip this one, (unless you just want to do it any way!)
The C1/4 is in, and is about N 66 W 39 ft from the calc BB int.
The S 1/4 is in.
The N 1/4 is proportioned in.
The S C1/16 is a point of intrest. There is a rock pile, very old. From the rock pile, it is 7.5 ft due west to the proportioned position, HOLDING the calc C1/4, at the BB int for the C1/4.
If I hold the EXISTING C1/4, then it moves the rock pile 25.5 ft west.
I am holding the rock pile, as it fits the OVERALL look at the section. Yielding to the C1/4 will be ok with me too.
Just an intresting situation. Around Hot Springs Ar!
Nate
"The answer is rarely in the calculations"...or something like that. Maybe Dennis Mouland said it... Anyway, it's true.
The term "bona fide" litterally means "in good faith". The surveyor that first set the C/4 corner surely didn't have the equipment we do today. But maybe he set it with the highest precision he had at the time. And maybe all the adjoiners relied on the corner as their boundary. They've all 'acted in good faith'..
The property owner's bona fide rights are just as important as the calcs.
Lots o' stuff to consider, Nate.
I hate word problems, need pictures, but it sure does look like you found a nice mess! Open up the can and watch them sliver out!
I used to be able to post PDF's, but right now, I don't have a host for them....
If I figure out where to host them, and ref to them, I can do a few pics.
Life is like that... a pic is worth a thousand words!
N
The rock pile is evidence of something. The calculations are also evidence. What the surveyors have done and what we think they should have done really doesn't amount to much when it comes to determining where the boundary is.
What have the LANDOWNERS done? That's what counts. Representations made about corner locations is just the first step to establishing the boundary. Reliance is the second necessary step. Is there evidence of reliance?
JBS
If established physical boundaries run in cardinal directions and the area is similar to the area called for by the aliquot part description, bona fide rights exist!
Proceed in manner that protects those rights by helping the owner correct the record description like the BLM is required to do in compliance with 43 USC 772.
If you are not under contract to the BLM, your state laws will determine what correction process and documentation are necessary.
Remember Wigmore;’s compendium on “Evidence”, 2nd. Edition, Vol. 5 Section 2476:
“It is not necessary, and it is not humanly possible, for the symbols of description, which we call words, to describe in every detail the objects designated by the symbols. The notion that a description is a complete enumeration is an instinctive fallacy which must be got rid of before interpretation can be properly attempted. …”
Surveyors interpret descriptions, we do not preserve them.
Richard Schaut
Nate
> I used to be able to post PDF's, but right now, I don't have a host for them....
Send the PDF's you want posted to me and I will mail you back a link Nate
It depends on the development of the section and the impact on multiple owners. Around here most of the sections are one owner owned. Sometimes two. What I choose to hold in those sections might be much different than in a section owned and occupied by many. Again the only all inclusive answer is that it depends, there is no one right answer for all conditions. Harmony and future harmony sometimes can be best preserved by making corrections, in other sections that approach will destroy harmony. Don't fail to look at all of the evidence with harmony in mind then you will never be wrong in whatever aproach you use. One view applied to every different condition will lead to problems for all. Boundary issues are not cook book instructions, you may need to add a little salt or not use so much, it is judgment of the overall conditions in all cases.
jud
If the whole section is in private ownership, there is no requirement to follow the Manual in creating parcels of land within that section. You only follow the Manual IF YOU ARE USING ALIQUOT PART DESCRIPTIONS! If an attorney wrongly used an aliquot part description when the owner(s) or their surveyor did not follow the Manual, the attorney was wrong and the correction is made to the description, not the established physical boundaries.
The determination to correct the description is the surveyor's responsdibility, not the attorney, title insurer nor lender.
Richard Schaut
The issue is what constitutes "Possession". If a logger, flaggs a line, and cuts timber to it, and adds a few rocks, and calls it a corner, is that the corner? What if he paints a line?
Does this BIND the neighbor when the rock pile is not real obvious, and the blazed and painted line is not real obvious?
I am saying that the HISTORY of a goober line, becomes quite important, and that will make it rise or fall.
Nate
It is the owner's responsibility, not the state or the surveyor, to protect the owner's interest.
If a state has a statute of repose or limitation that says an occupation line, in place and unchallenged by any affected owner for a set period of time, that physical line is the legal property line and any challenge is therefore barred. In your example, the logging is open and notorious so the adjoiner has the time period, (5 or 10 yrs usually), after the logging to raise the opbjection before it is barred.
It is the surveyor's responsibility to know that law and obey it! Neither lawyers nor judges have any obligation to bother with that law unless they are dealing with a complaint against a surveyor. (See Curtis M. Brown's talk about the surveyor's liability to unwritten rights.)
The 'line' may even be butcher's string stretched between two goat stakes as long as neither owner occupied or controled land beyond their side of the string.
Richard Schaut
OK Richard, you are in the minority with your beliefs.... however, I am sure that there is SOME truth to your approach. I have approched a few surveys with your philosophy. BUT, not all of them.
Like:
The old fence line. Been there for 40 yrs + -. Crooked as a water hose, across a yard. They USED it for the cows, but, after talking with my client, about unwritten rights, he wanted to KNOW where the 40 line was, and in relationship with the fence. I told him, and he said that the fence was there when his dad bought it. After talking with his dad, his dad said he did not know. And, the adjoiner did not know either. I staked the 40 line. My client gained about 10 big pine trees.
But, now the line is STRAIGHT. And, that was what the deeds said, and what they all knew it was supposed to be.
So, 40 line it is.
Nate
