@bruce-small (Venting, please ignore if necessary) They really think they are helping when after they are done, they pick the monumentation up and poke it back in the ground where it was before they dug it up.
If the cap is smashed clean through to the metal or it is sticking up half a foot, is it still original monumentation, or just no longer in the original location?
If you do not ‘hold’ moved original monumentation, next month, Jr. Surveyor calls you up and says your survey is wrong.
@oldpacer - we would call it still the original monumentation.
But we have the concept of 'disturbed' - as in 'not in the original relationship with other boundary and witness marks'.
That is not to say it is in the original position - the whole shebang may have moved. In fact it is moving - we have a couple of very dynamic tectonic plates down here.
If you do not ‘hold’ moved original monumentation, next month, Jr. Surveyor calls you up and says your survey is wrong.
Not if you include a narrative.
Very interesting replies so far thank you. Mainly interesting because it flies in the face of what I’ve been doing in my brief career and of what other surveyors in these parts seem to be doing with their surveys
@oldpacer This lead cap was sticking up beside the transformer pad, a good three feet away from the lot corner in front of the pad. Not the slightest doubt in my mind an original monument but not even close to the original position. Sid Kain was never one to make a mistake like that.
I liked the way that one of our wooden boundary pegs I found was nailed completely above ground to the fencepost that replaced it
The two words monument and corner can be synonyms. However, when the physical representation of the corner is moved, then it no longer occupies the corner.
An original monument creates the corner (with exceptions of course) but when it's disturbed like Bruce's example the corner doesn't move with it. Now the monument is at best a reference monument. Scribe an X on the transformer and show the B&D from the now reference monument to the corner. Or pull the dang thing and set a WC on the property line.
Find a crumbling set stone and replace it with a brass cap, bury the stone alongside and now the original stone monument is a memorial.
I would call Jim Cox's example a memorial monument, maybe it could be made into a reference, doesn't sound like it.
When you figure out what type of object you're dealing with, it's very helpful to complete a survey. Clearly unless you have a time machine much of what we do is conjecture and evaluation of evidence gleaned from our experience.
But using correct terminology is very important.
monument, corner, reference, witness, memorial, accessory, existing, existent, obliterated, lost, disturbed.
Figure out what the correct term for the object you're looking at and you're a long way to finishing the survey.
how can one say whether or not a found monument at one of its corners is an 'original' one that should be accepted if there's no record of when or by whom it was set?
This is when you ask the old surveyor what he usually finds in that plat. Honestly, I moved to a new county, and without a long time surveyor on staff here, it would be very difficult to make some of those decisions.
