Survey Marker Question
#7684981
10/04/22 07:05 AM
10/04/22 07:05 AM
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Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 3,897 Wisconsin
Eagleye
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OP
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Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 3,897
Wisconsin
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: Eagleye]
#7684995
10/04/22 07:27 AM
10/04/22 07:27 AM
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Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 19,930 SEPA
Lugnut
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Posts: 19,930
SEPA
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In my County the Tax Claims Bureau keeps the County plat maps. Your Deed should have a physical description of the property, here that would be the Recorder of Deeds office. We also have a Dept. of Mapping that provides online plat maps at the county level.
My first call wound be to the County Courthouse.
Eh...wot?
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: waggler]
#7685018
10/04/22 08:18 AM
10/04/22 08:18 AM
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Joined: Oct 2011
Posts: 2,420 Idaho
bearcat2
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Idaho
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Why not just call the "County Surveyor" like the sign asks? I bet you'll get all your questions answered. My thoughts exactly. Now I surveyed for quite a few years out west here, and I never either set or seen one that had "for information contact the county surveyor" stamped on it, but that would incline me to believe it was set by the county. So even if it was old enough not to be recorded at the county courthouse (where registered surveys are recorded in at least all the states I've worked in) there should be a copy at the office of the surveyor who set it, and I'm guessing by the words stamped on it, also in the county surveyors office, if they aren't one and the same person. Usually on anything new enough to be aluminum around here they have their LS (licensed surveyor) number stamped on the cap, but that doesn't appear to have one to identify who set it. As has been stated, it likely may not have anything to do with your property lines. I surveyed enough places where the lines weren't where people (particularly realtors) thought or at least claimed they were, that I have always said I will never buy a place without it being surveyed first.
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: Eagleye]
#7685023
10/04/22 08:31 AM
10/04/22 08:31 AM
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Joined: Jul 2016
Posts: 2,740 Wisconsin
Bear Tracker
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Wisconsin
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County survey section marker. We have them in four different spots on our land in Chippewa Cty. We even have an interesting one where there is a reference marker on top of a post 30 yards north of the section marker which is buried under a dirt road. Contact your county surveyor, he can give all the details surrounding it. Correct in that it does not mean your land is surveyed. We received a manila envelope stuffed with pictures and history. The two guys hunting the neighbors thought that the reference marker was the property line and posted no trespassing signs 30 yards into our property. I climb up into my rifle stand opening day on an old beaver pond and there is a sign on a dead tree on our property. Lets just say it went down hill from there for them!
Last edited by Bear Tracker; 10/04/22 08:34 AM.
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: Eagleye]
#7685160
10/04/22 12:47 PM
10/04/22 12:47 PM
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Joined: Sep 2011
Posts: 2,581 sometimes PA sometimes ME
ebsurveyor
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sometimes PA sometimes ME
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Just for clarification, First off the "metes & bounds came from a survey. Said survey may be 100 years old and the description just repeated when the real estate sold. A modern survey will just duplicate those metes & bounds to the best of their ability. The purpose on the county monuments is unknow and probably have nothing to do with your boundaries. I have set many 100's of monuments similar to the one you found. None of the monuments I set had anything to do with boundaries. Us surveyors have been setting monuments similar to the one you found for the past 175 years. Yours is fairly new from the looks of it. Call the county surveyor. I'm not sure when we started seeing aluminum monuments, but I was setting them in the 1970's.
Last edited by ebsurveyor; 10/04/22 01:03 PM.
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: Eagleye]
#7685304
10/04/22 04:37 PM
10/04/22 04:37 PM
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Joined: Oct 2011
Posts: 2,420 Idaho
bearcat2
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Great feedback from everyone- I talked to the Town Surveyor: The original Government Survey was conducted in June & July of 1855 and a 1-1/2" iron pipe was placed in the section corner, the area was resurveyed between 1910-1925 with no records found, in 2013 they set the monument shown in my picture over the original 1-1/2 iron pipe from 1855 and the surveyor accepted that mark as the corner. Soooo... either the methods of the 1855 surveyor were dead nuts or the 2013 surveyor wanted to be directionally correct rather than preciously wrong?
Appreciate everyone's time and insights in responding. No, if you find the corner or evidence of the corner set by the original GLO surveyors you hold it. No ifs, ands, or buts, anything set by the original GLO surveyors is where it is. All surveying since then is retracing or attempting to retrace the original survey. I've retraced stuff done in the 1890s in extremely rugged mountains where the GLO surveyors pulling chain had miles that were within a foot or two of 5280 and I've did stuff on flat ground where they had a 6000 foot mile with a 4000 half mile and a 9 degree angle point at the quarter corner. Some were a LOT better than others, but it doesn't matter, what they set holds.
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: martentrapper]
#7685598
10/04/22 10:14 PM
10/04/22 10:14 PM
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Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 7,112 Three Lakes,WI 72
corky
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How could you do an accurate survey in Wisconsin in 1855? Wouldn't there still have been Indians taking scalps? I have seen old railroad surveys and some government establishment markers that were actually done by running sight lines from one bonfire to another. They were amazingly accurate considering the equipment they had.
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: waggler]
#7685610
10/04/22 10:24 PM
10/04/22 10:24 PM
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Joined: Jan 2016
Posts: 10,007 WI - Wisconsin
AJE
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Why not just call the "County Surveyor" like the sign asks? I bet you'll get all your questions answered. X2. Maybe the town surveyor was just as helpful though. I've never heard f a town surveyor.
Last edited by AJE; 10/04/22 10:41 PM.
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: martentrapper]
#7685623
10/04/22 10:29 PM
10/04/22 10:29 PM
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Joined: Oct 2011
Posts: 2,420 Idaho
bearcat2
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How could you do an accurate survey in Wisconsin in 1855? Wouldn't there still have been Indians taking scalps? Depends on how good you were, running a stiff... ahem, staff compass is a skill bordering on an art, and pulling chain (a chain is 66 feet, there are 80 chains in a mile, this is how they used survey) can be done pretty accurately, but it takes work and attention to detail. And I have actually read in the original GLO notes when looking for old corners set in the 1880's, where the note said, "lost chainman to Indians." Also read in another one where they noted at what distance from the section corner, "chainman attacked by bear." Used to be dangerous to be the guy working out front.
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: bearcat2]
#7685784
10/05/22 06:58 AM
10/05/22 06:58 AM
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Joined: Oct 2012
Posts: 3,897 Wisconsin
Eagleye
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Wisconsin
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How could you do an accurate survey in Wisconsin in 1855? Wouldn't there still have been Indians taking scalps? Depends on how good you were, running a stiff... ahem, staff compass is a skill bordering on an art, and pulling chain (a chain is 66 feet, there are 80 chains in a mile, this is how they used survey) can be done pretty accurately, but it takes work and attention to detail. And I have actually read in the original GLO notes when looking for old corners set in the 1880's, where the note said, "lost chainman to Indians." Also read in another one where they noted at what distance from the section corner, "chainman attacked by bear." Used to be dangerous to be the guy working out front. Interesting: According to the US Public Land Survey Monument Record- the 1855 survey monument was a post and it lists Original Accessories: 10"Elm, W. 12 links; 16" Birch, N 85 E, 20 links. I assume the links are associated with the chain and great detail is listed on how he entered and exited the property, this also makes sense if you're pulling a chain.
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: Eagleye]
#7685846
10/05/22 08:46 AM
10/05/22 08:46 AM
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Joined: Oct 2011
Posts: 2,420 Idaho
bearcat2
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Yes, a link is .66 feet. At least in the west they measured in chains and links, and very rarely rods. Yes, good GLO notes have "ground calls"; crossed creek at X chains, top ridge at X chains, etc. Posts are what I was used to being set on the coast, and I only ever seen one original post in that wet climate, I did however find the remains of the sharpened point of a couple, with axe marks visible, when digging below the ground. Here they set a fair number of stones, but the trees you mention are BTs (bearing tree) and those are what we normally looked for to find/replace the corner. I've never looked for elm or birch, since we don't have them, but they would flatten a face in those trees with an axe and then scribe into them the Township, Range, Section, etc. That would eventually grow over of course, but the scar will remain visible and on many of the firs, pines, and tamarack that face will pitch over and then grow over, after the tree dies, is cut down, etc., the rest of the tree may rot away but that pitched over face will remain solid.
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Re: Survey Marker Question
[Re: bearcat2]
#7685877
10/05/22 09:43 AM
10/05/22 09:43 AM
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Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 5,981 Rock Springs, WI
Zim
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Rock Springs, WI
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The chances of the original surveyor setting an iron pipe in northern Wisconsin in 1855 range from zero to very unlikely. Those old surveyors made a stake from cedar if they could find it, stone if it was available, or any material that was handy. I doubt if there was an iron pipe in all of Rusk County in 1855 much less one to be placed in the ground. A subsequent surveyor likely recovered the original post and replaced it with a pipe years later. This will be documented in the County Surveyor's records. Original GLO surveys in Wisconsin from the 1840's through the 1850's can range from amazingly precise to amazingly inaccurate. The guys who drew the unlucky task of surveying northern Wisconsin had a very rough go of it. Living in tents, insects, lack of supplies and whiskey, keeping axe men and chainmen on the job, meandering the many lakes, rivers and swamps that impede line of sight, etc. made for some tough times. All for 1 dollar a mile surveyed, they were some tough and talented men. And then there were place like Iron County where ferrous deposits caused anomalies with the compass needle so that 10 to 15 degree bends in section lines are common. The early surveyors were required to document all conditions and these reports facilitated early settlement of the state.
Zim
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