I have 3.5 miles of property boundary. Every year it takes me about 20-30 hours before hunting season to walk the boundary, paint (blue paint, orange flagging) trees and posts, and staple up new signs. The Tyvex signs last about 2 years before they need replacing. The flagging lasts about 3-4 years, and the blue paint is 5-7 years. I spend the time, and about a hundred bucks in signs, paint, and flagging; and I still get the occasional yahoo who gives me the "I thought I was on state forest/HNF BS. You pass by a near continuous line of marking, and it really does take all three to make it obvious under all conditions. The blue is very visible in the daytime, the orange at dawn/dusk, and they both draw attention to the signs. On a rare occasion I've missed a year and half of the signs are down. It's also harder for yahoos who hunt neighboring properties to remove paint from a tree whereas signs are just target practice.
Purple paint is trespassing. They passed that law a few weeks ago now. Are you sure you were in the right place? Quite a few people have property that butts up to the states property.
Hello all, I emailed the Morgan Monroe forest office asking about the purple paint and received the following reply regarding the purple paint. I am going to assume that the paint is not referring to "no trespassing" or anything significant to what I am doing.
Hello ,
I hope you had a successful mushroom hunt as I’ve been hearing from most people that it is a down year. State forest boundaries are marked with 3 rectangles of orange paint on trees on or directly adjacent to the boundary lines. One rectangle faces in to the state forest property and the other two face the direction of the line. I am aware that many states have the purple paint law. There was a recent attempt in Indiana to do so, but I do not believe it passed. We use purple paint for timber sales, but I do not see that we have any upcoming sales for that area. It is difficult to say with certainty however without knowing your exact location. Another possibility is that those are trees marked for some reason within the Hardwood Ecosystem Experiment. You can find information about that at https://ag.purdue.edu/hee/Pages/default.aspx Blue is generally the most common color we use for marking timber for timber sales. We also use light purple, red, and sometimes yellow. I hope this answers your questions. If you would like more information or have other questions, please feel free to email me directly at any time.
Thank You,
Mike Spalding, Resource Supervisor, Yellowwood and Morgan-Monroe State Forests
Anyone have the IC reference?
Well that was a damn cordial response from Mike Spalding!! Thanks for sharing it!
Well that was a damn cordial response from Mike Spalding!! Thanks for sharing it!
Years ago, South Dakota stopped making the land owners post their property, and rightly so. All land is considered to be posted unless there are signs saying otherwise. The land owners should not have to pay for all the signs and the labor to put them up. Where State land is bordering private property, it's the State's responsibility to post the State's property and the boundaries. After all, shouldn't your property taxes be adequate compensation for protecting your land from trespassers without having to donate more signage and time for what is yours?