rangewalker
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Post by rangewalker on May 26, 2023 20:02:39 GMT -8
Millions of acres of Federally managed public lands in the West have difficult to no legal access. One of the leading issues is the checkboard pattern set by railroad grants in the late 1800s. Remember your history of the transcontinental railroad or the various exchanges from the Homestead Acts. A critical case in Federal court over both trespass by corner crossing, i.e. breaking the plane of land ownership swing a leg over a fence corner. The hunters went from a BLM section into another BLM section. That crossing gave them access to thousands of acres of BLM land. The land owner cotends they trespassed and degraded the value of his deeded land when he lost exclusive use of the BLM land he held in a grazing lease. In June, the court will hear arguments that a waypoint found on the phone of one to the defendants was on the deeded land. Oh man, I have ladders from setting bait stations from a wolverine study. And two wilderness study areas that are locked in a couple of corners. My interests are hiking and birding. The photo is from an assessor's map on an area near Hole in the Wall and Outlaw Cave (Butch Cassidy dreams) to give an idea of the navigation issues I work with all the time. White = deeded; pink State Trust Land, yellow = BLM. Breaking News on Corner Crossing |
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zeke
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Post by zeke on May 27, 2023 4:49:57 GMT -8
The greed of the rancher is appalling. His grazing lease in no way grants him exclusive use. If the hunters did nothing more than walk across his deeded property, they certainly did no harm. I can only hope the court sees it that way as well.
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Travis
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Post by Travis on May 27, 2023 6:15:50 GMT -8
What the rancher is claiming is, in effect, that if his neighbors have access to their land, it will devalue his land. Of course that implies that his land's value is greatly inflated by having exclusive access to his neighbors' land. We, the general public, are his neighbors. The court rejected his claims to the extent that his neighbors can cross corners, as long as they don't physically touch his land. Yet to be decided is whether those neighbors can actually touch his land in crossing corners. It seems to me that there would be a Common Law public easement anywhere necessary to access public land, even if that means crossing private land, but one can only hope the courts see it that way. Here is a map of the checkerboard pattern of ownership around Elk Mountain, where the nuisance rancher owns land in south-central Wyoming. Yellow is BLM-managed federal land. Blue is state land (click to enlarge map):  |
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rebeccad
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Post by rebeccad on May 27, 2023 7:05:14 GMT -8
Clearly Wyoming needs a Right to Roam law. I never understood a grazing lease to mean that you get exclusive access to land, just exclusive right to graze your animals there. I believe the CA landowner who tried to close a traditional access across his land to the beach (all CA beaches are public land from the high tide line down) lost in court, but that’s a CA court  |
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reuben
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Post by reuben on May 27, 2023 7:12:44 GMT -8
What Rebecca said.
He's complaining that he doesn't have exclusive access to something (land) that belongs to someone else (BLM).
Absurd. I wish I was the judge for this one, but the American west has its own history, culture, and way of thinking, so who knows how this will turn out?
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Travis
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Post by Travis on May 27, 2023 7:50:21 GMT -8
I never understood a grazing lease to mean that you get exclusive access to land, just exclusive right to graze your animals there. That's correct. However, ranchers in Wyoming customarily refer to grazing rights in terms of "leased land." In fact, they have not leased the land. They have merely purchased grazing rights. The rancher in this dispute is not even a resident of Wyoming, but he is trying to capitalize on misconceptions many Wyoming residents hold.
I believe the CA landowner who tried to close a traditional access across his land to the beach (all CA beaches are public land from the high tide line down) lost in court, but that’s a CA court
That is also English Common Law inherited by US Jurisprudence and thus, the State of Wyoming. And that probably partly explains why the landowner is pursuing this in civil court rather than criminal court, as I understand it.
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Travis
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Post by Travis on May 27, 2023 8:47:41 GMT -8
That is also English Common Law inherited by US Jurisprudence and thus, the State of Wyoming. More specifically, it is codified in Federal law as Title 43 Public Lands, Chapter 25 ( 43 USC Ch. 25), that is, the Unlawful Inclosures Act of 1885: |
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BigLoad
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Post by BigLoad on May 27, 2023 9:02:29 GMT -8
What the rancher is claiming is, in effect, that if his neighbors have access to their land, it will devalue his land. Of course that implies that his land's value is greatly inflated by having exclusive access to his neighbors' land. We, the general public, are his neighbors.
I wonder how many times the words "legacy" and "heritage" appear in his filings.
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Travis
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Post by Travis on May 27, 2023 9:33:41 GMT -8
What the rancher is claiming is, in effect, that if his neighbors have access to their land, it will devalue his land. Of course that implies that his land's value is greatly inflated by having exclusive access to his neighbors' land. We, the general public, are his neighbors.
I wonder how many times the words "legacy" and "heritage" appear in his filings.
Yeah, and "traditional way of life." The guy is an absentee landowner who made millions from pharmaceuticals and then perhaps to bolster his image as a manly man bought ranch land to hunt mountain lions on in his spare time.
Wyofile has an interesting profile on what exactly constitutes Fred Eshelman's legacy and traditional way of life. It's not exactly family ranching, though I'm sure the Wyoming Stockgrowers Associations support his claims. (Disclaimer: includes political affiliations.) |
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rangewalker
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Post by rangewalker on May 29, 2023 6:43:31 GMT -8
Travis' map is better example than mine. Here is a map of the checkerboard pattern of ownership around Elk Mountain, where the nuisance rancher owns land in south-central Wyoming. Yellow is BLM-managed federal land. Blue is state land (click to enlarge map): A personal update. Over the weekend I meet with two Wyoming legislators, full disclosure some of the few serving Dems in the state, and talked to one other. The backlash in the legislature will be very partisan and led by groups like the Wyoming Stock Growers Association and the Farm Bureau to extend private property rights in that space above surface rights. The war between the public and the West's New Gilded Age on enormous wealth and the land and water may have already been lost for a decade in Montana. The Governor illegally blocked stream access on his lands for years and got away with it. There has been an extreme uptick in vandalism from some shooters and ORV enthusiasts together with slick property rights media making like besieged Duttons from Yellowstone streaming against public access that are kicking in too. Ten years ago when I was retired from industry and was happily tramping around as a Wildlands Specialist for a Wilderness advocacy NGO, I encountered one of the rancher "custom and culture" clashes that exists everyday in the mountain west states. I was asking permission to hike across their land, usually following a two track route to a BLM boundary. Every time, I would get asked if I had permission to access the area? I would say no, it was BLM. federally managed public land. The answer would be no, they would not give me permission to "cross some one else's property without their permission." Then if I brought up the Wilderness Study Area as the reason, the conversation could get heated. Threatening a few times. I have have not corner crossed or slid across private property, knowingly, since a teen hiker to gain access. I could not afford the fines or had the resources to fight. In the last decade, it would have destroyed my public lands work or tainted the organizations that I represented. unlike my opening line in this thread, I got the targets and the ladder now. |
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ErnieW
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Post by ErnieW on May 29, 2023 7:58:09 GMT -8
I know nothing about all this. Who owns the air above private property? Just hypothetically if you used GPS to know exactly where the corner was then pole vaulted across without touching private land is that any violation? Is this what you are referring to when you mention ladder?
One thing I am guessing is that good old boys with money end up winning even if it it is basically illegal.
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BigLoad
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Post by BigLoad on May 29, 2023 9:07:37 GMT -8
I have have not corner crossed or slid across private property, knowingly, since a teen hiker to gain access.
It may have gotten worse with the popularity of "Yellowstone". Alarming number of people get killed on that show for violating western customs, and the threat of violence is ubiquitous.
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rangewalker
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Post by rangewalker on May 29, 2023 20:33:22 GMT -8
Who owns the air above private property? Just hypothetically if you used GPS to know exactly where the corner was then pole vaulted across without touching private land is that any violation? Is this what you are referring to when you mention ladder?There have been trespass convictions and a theory enforced that a plane exists straight up into space from the surface boundary. I have used used and been used by it on overhanging trees. I wish I had a photo to show you and I will get one this week of a ladder propped up in a fence corner. Simply put, place ladder and swing leg over. Or you could have a corner like the photo, four corners, but instead of a fence, you have this section marker. Imagine Section 30 and 32 are your public BLM land, Sections 31 and 29 are deeded private land. I have been hiking through Section 32 to this point and want to continue on BLM land in Section 32 to go to a cool canyon rim. If I step around into 31 or 29, that would be a trespass, at least in custom and culture. In real life, this section marker, a 110 year old land survey marker. is the legal instrument of right and trespass. Not any GPS.  In real life, I spent a morning trying to locate this corner. BLM map and the in-person research I had done at the courthouse. This location is Township 48N Range 87W and covers Sections 30, 29, 30, and 32 were they come together.
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BigLoad
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Post by BigLoad on May 29, 2023 20:53:53 GMT -8
And unless you are infinitely thin, you can't go between 30 and 32 without trespassing in both 29 and 31.
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reuben
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Post by reuben on May 30, 2023 0:24:13 GMT -8
My understanding is that land rights extend to the center of the earth - oil, minerals, water, etc. If that's still true, it wouldn't be a stretch to claim the same above ground, although the FAA may object.
But in any case, it's just pure selfishness and greed.
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