There is a chance on the horizon for some work in Oklahoma. What shall I prepare myself for? Looks like www.osls.org has lots of info. Any advice, suggestions, horror stories of people from Missouri screwing things up? Any strange PLSS items?
N10,000, E7,000, Z100.00
PLS - IL, MO, AR, KS, MN, KY
Big State. It really depends where you're at to answer your questions. But I'll give you a general rundown.
If you're actually going to do some work on I-44, good luck. Most of it was built back in the 50s. The original R/W takes were fairly sloppy and some are even written from CL stations. Hopefully somebody else has been out there since the '50s.
Strange PLSS items? hmmm...they're all strange down here. On a good note, there are still thousands of existing monuments out there. At some corners there may be more than one...really. Lots of resurveying went on from 1874 to 1910. Lots of notes (which are really dependent resurveys if you read the notes) are recorded as original surveys in the GLO catalogue. A good deal of them were performed by the USGS. Some are good. Some are cartoons.
I've found existing bearing trees from the 1874 original survey; with copies of an 1899 USGS "resurvey" that states no evidence was found of the original survey, or they obliterated the original 1874 survey. Both are usually lies. All the possession and subdivision line fit the original notes. It's usually pretty evident which survey has been adhered to.
About the only semi-unique PLSS item around here is the Native American allotment surveys where a few years after the sections were originally laid out, they came back through cutting them up in 40 acre allotments. This is considered the "Three Mile Method" and it affects the way a section subdivision should be properly retraced.
We're all pretty friendly down here and we drive like a-holes. Good luck! 😉