TITLES 233 



As already stated the question of determining the rightful 

 claimant to a piece of woodland is much more difl&cult than in 

 the case of farmland. A man who owns a farm either lives on it, 

 rents it or manages it thru an agent. He must fence it, cultivate 

 it and keep the buildings in repair. It is a matter of common 

 knowledge who the real owner is. None of these acts of possession 

 are necessary in the case of woodland. Even paying the taxes 

 and cutting the timber have been held to be no sure indication 

 of ownership. Nor should they be because many lots have been 

 cut illegally and taxes have been paid in many cases merely to 

 acquire color of title. For example, there have been a number of 

 notorious cases of woodland theft in northern New England in 

 which the title of the illegal claimant was based on a quit claim 

 deed supported by tax receipts. The quit claim deeds were 

 secured at a nominal figure from persons who had never seen the 

 land, much less owned it. In order to cover up all traces of wrong 

 doing and weaken the case of the rightful claimants the county 

 records were often wilfully destroyed. The point of all this is, 

 of course, that acts of possession have nowhere near the same 

 force with reference to woodland as with other forms of real estate. 

 It is, therefore, all the more necessary for the woodland owner to 

 make sure that every proper act of possession is carefully put on 

 record. This would mean filing a careful description and map 

 in the County Clerk's Office, renewing the monuments and 

 blazes, keeping up taxes, and curbing all forms of trespass. 



The mere fact that there is uncertainty as to what constitutes 

 an " act of possession " with reference to woodland makes a title 

 search all the more necessary. Both the owner and prospective 

 purchaser need to know whether there are rival claimants, and 

 this only a thoro search of the local legal records will give. The 

 Department of Agriculture in its investigations of the titles offered 

 for purchase under the provisions of the Weeks Law has set a 

 standard for such work. They try to secure for each deed or 

 mortgage the following information: 



1. Kind of conveyance, date, date and place recorded and 



volume and page. 



2. Name and address of vendor. 



