CLAIM MAPPING & GROUND VERIFICATION

A report screens at the quarter section level and details active claim density. You want a closer look. So we plot the active claims and verify the open ground — mapping what third-party claims actually capture, resolving where senior positions really sit, and confirming what is genuinely open in the gaps. Done by a landman, on the record and on the ground. It is the step that decides whether the claims you file will hold.

What This Step Covers

• Third-party claim mapping — the boundaries of existing claims in and around the target area, drawn from the record rather than assumed from a section-level index.
• Captured ground — what each of those claims genuinely holds, which is frequently not what its recorded description implies. Claims are laid out by people, in the field, sometimes decades ago.
• Seniority resolution — where positions overlap, which one controls, determined by location date and traced to the specific senior claim.
• The gaps — open ground between and around existing positions, including ground that was never actually covered by the claims that appear to surround it.
• Excluded ground — patented and fee land, state land, withdrawn ground, and any other area closed to location, resolved at boundary rather than section resolution.
• Confirmation against the record — findings checked against the controlling General Land Office (GLO) documents, which ClaimWatch holds in-house rather than requesting from a government site that may or may not be up that day.

How It Works

This is the deliberately human step in the workflow, and it stays that way for a reason: an automated screen can tell you a quarter is worth a closer look, but it cannot tell you where a monument was actually set, which of two conflicting descriptions controls, or whether the ground between two claim blocks is genuinely open or merely undocumented.

The mapping is built on ClaimWatch’s data foundation — the complete federal claim record and the in-house General Land Office archive — so the landman starts from a full picture rather than from a request queue. What follows is professional judgment applied to that picture: reading the records, resolving the conflicts, and confirming the result.

Where the record cannot settle a position, it gets confirmed on the ground.

What You Get

A worked map of the target area showing third-party claims, the ground each one captures, senior and junior positions, excluded ground, and the open ground that remains — with the supporting records behind each finding. It is delivered as GIS layers alongside the map, so it flows directly into the staking layout that follows.

If the answer is that there is not enough open ground to justify a program, you get that answer too — before you have paid for a field crew.

Who Needs This

• Exploration companies about to commit to a staking program and needing to know how much ground is genuinely available first.
• Mining companies expanding an existing block, where the question is precisely where their position ends and someone else’s begins.
• Acquirers evaluating a claim block and needing to know how much of the stated acreage survives contact with the surrounding positions.
• Landmen and consultants who need the mapping work done at volume and to a standard they can put their name on.