Most of the comments, to this post have been concilatory to the Land Owners. I would like to take the other side of the argument. The land, with its pictographs, was there before the Land Owners, or their recent ancesters were born. Now the Land Owners say because they were their first, with the right amount of money, only they, or their invited guests are allowed to see, up close, this historical treasure. It may be legal to hord a historical tresure, but is it right? It is this kind of greed and unwillingness to care about others needs and concerns that is causeing most of the problems this country is experiencing.
Why be so negetive about people? Put up a honors donation box
Really??????????????????

why should they they own it you want folks coming in your yard screwing with your stuff. Doesnt matter what it is national treasure or yard gnome, it aint yours you dont have even a wimper to say about it

Trespassing is trespassing.

The picture taker must have been smart and edited out all the trespass signs.

This is bad news for this area if the land owners get butt hurt over this.

landowners in texas have rights they buy property an pay property taxes on said land if for any reason they dont want you tresspassing on thier land that should be good enough. when folks get caught trespassing they shouldnt whine about the mess they put themselves in.

Sure wish I could get my bass boat that far up the river. That is beautiful country.

First of all, my front yard is not an archiology landmark. Second, by your logic, if someone owns a piece of property they can do whatever they want with it. If that is true, they could sell it to a developer, and he could build a subdivision on the site. Third, the land owner could have a NO TESSPASSING sign every foot. If someone gets hurt on his property, a lawer is still going to take the case, and sue. I am suggesting giving the TPWD some right to administrate the property, and make improvements. Allow people to experience, and appreciate, this archiological treasure. The lawers will then go after the state, instead of the land owners.

lawyer can be found to take a case for any thing, poor argument for the erosion of private property rights. but what if i really want to check out you front yard, perhaps i fing it fascinating and am compelled to look at your gatden gnome and wizz on you tree. not trying to project on to you but WAY to many are willing to sugest that its wrong of A not allow B . Short jump to compelling A to do. Both are anti Texas

That's what being a land owner is for. People cannot very well visit your yard at their leisure, or camp out in your driveway.

Yes, you can find a lawyer who will sue for anything.

However, putting up No Trespassing signs is a far cry from setting up something that gives tacit approval of entrance to the property.

Putting in a campground or donation box says "you can come on this property and stay here". That means the landowner is willing to take on liability.

That isn't to say they wouldn't get sued under current conditions, but currently the landowner is saying they are not willing to take on liability. Currently the person suing can't bring a suit without admitting to a crime and being charged with trespass. Go talk to a South Texas judge and find out how well that would fly in his court.

Any argument about the artifacts being owned by "the world" or whatever other hippie notion you can come up with are ridiculous and frankly naive. The reality is that people own things, and they are under no obligation to share them.

This has been an interesting topic to follow, why not just have the gov't take all the personal land and make it public so we can all share. Ok there is some sarcasm in that sentence. If I owned the land I would not be happy if people who just coming onto it without permission. The river is public but the land is not.
Is there a chance that landowners if they wanted to make a few bucks/or allow other to share and not be liable for suit if TPWD was their top cover?
TPWD wouldn't own the land but rather help the landowner make it more open and use their own lawyers to keep suits from happening?

I have enjoyed a couple wonderful float trips down the Devils and can appreciate the desire by everyone to experience it but for those who think the land owners are in the wrong...you need to wake up in the morning and find a bunch of people camping on your front lawn. Might give you a more open view of the issues. Just sayn.

Hey Hadacall. You want the land owner to "give" rights to TPWD so you can visit the land owner's private property? Instead of holding your hand out for a donation, utilize your own assets to purchase an "archiology landmark" and you can "give" control rights to TPWD. If you don't have that kind of financial capacity, visit someplace you can buy a ticket to, like Sea World.

Like the debate, love the comments from the majority that gets it. I support the landowners who have protected the resource for whatever reason. How do you like your Frio at Garner, Guadalupe at Gruene? It's not that there's only one Mona Lisa in rock art- the public has full access to seminole Canyon S.P., Hueco Tanks S.P., etc. And in the Rio Grande, Pecos, and devils canyons there are 100's of sites- mostly private, but some open to the paying public.
http://www.shumla.org/
http://www.rockart.org/

I know that almost everyone on this forum does the right thing. What screws it up for us are the few immature thrill-seeker yahoos. Take a look at the People of Walmart demographic and ask if you want to give them the keys to the Museum.

At least in Tx we have the right to go anywhere on the water that is navigable. The water is ours except for a few marinas that will not let you fish around their docks. That one still evades me. It IS our water. In Ok. the water running thru private land belongs to the owner of the property and they can fence it off if they so desire. It has happened all over eastern Ok. where I was raised. Before the bigger land owners sold of their land in 5-10 acre lots, I walked those small streams and fished there everyday. Now the streams I loved as a child and young man have a fence every 100 yards and those people will shoot you for being on their property. We have it pretty good in Tx. At least we can travel on the water and see a lot of nature. I can see where the landowners would not want you camping on their property and making a mess of it. If the people would only leave the place the way found it ( pristene and undamaged ) the landowners might be willing to allow TPWD to fence off a place for a very limited amount of campers and have a fenced off path to thesome of these archiological finds. I am not sure I would allow it because I do not own the propery. A lot of people these days have no respect for nature and the beauty of the land and they do not care in what condition they leave a place they have visited. These are the people that give us all a bad reputation. This is just my 2 cents worth on the subject and anyone has the right to agree or not.

Gene

I have ties to both sides of this. I have paddled the devils river many times as paddler, for the love of the river. I also have friends (not going to say names) who have land on the river. Forever, I was always mad at the landowners for being so protective and restrictive of their property, and even, in many cases, trying to prevent people from accessing the river at all. I never understood why they did not want people to go down the Devils River.

Then I became friends with some landowners, without knowing they were landowners (and them not knowing that I was a paddler.) Anyway, overtime, we figured each other out and had discussions about the river, the land, and what people do with it. It is true that 15% of paddlers on the river leave it cleaner than when they came. 70% leave it like they find it (or so they think), and 15% have no respect. Those 15% ruin it for everyone else, and even many that think they are not leaving a trace really are.

I was shown piles of human [censored], that landowners stumble into from time to time, discarded fishing line, some trash (though not much), and countless cigarette butts. I know I wouldn't want to step into a pile of human [censored] while going to pick up someone else's cigarette butt.

But then again, cutting the river off to the public does no good either...so...what do you do?

The simple fact is there are way to many people who are going to make the trip and take something that is not theirs. If it was my property i would let people take all the pictures they want but if they stepped on my land i would be upset and would treat it like any other trespassing case. The general public cannot just look, They want to touch and feel to.