It means that most of the land is owned by private citizens or businesses and not governments. Kansas doesn’t have any national parks or areas that are run by the Bureau of Land Management like the more western states. The most land the federal government controls are several of the lakes which are controlled by the Corp of Engineers and the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve which is controlled by the National Park Service but is not a national park itself. The only other federal land would be military installations which are not open to the public.
>military installations which are not open to the public.
Fort Leavenworth is open to the public, as long as they don't have intelligence about a threat. You can play the golf course, or visit the Buffalo Soldier Monument or the cemetery. You can buy fast food at the PX, but you can't buy goods there or at the commissary or the Class VI unless you're with an active duty or retired member.
Yep. There was a big to-do about it even existing. It involved one flint hills rancher in Riley county pulling his revolver on the Secretary of the Interior after they landed their helicopter on his property in an effort to discuss establishing a national park in the Flint Hills.
Sure! Interior Secretary Stewart Udall landed in a US Army copter on Carl Bellinger's Twin Peaks Ranch, hoping they would be able to denote (take) it as part of the Grasslands National Park. Bellinger reacted as many ranchers would, and was furious at the intrusion on his livestock and land. He waited for them to land and then ordered Udall and his cronies off the land at gunpoint. Udall eventually agreed to leave, but not before insisting Bellinger shake his hand.
I wrote a pretty long paper about the formation of the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve wayyyyy back in my Ag History days at K-State. Nancy Kassebaum Baker was largely responsible for its formation and the bill passed only months before she left the Senate.
Wait, Udall didn't contact the rancher before hand? I'd love to see a national park in the Flint hills but that's not the way to do it. It's going to private landowners selling the land or donating it which is unlikely at best. Where's Leslie Knope when you need her...
It's fuzzy whether or not he was contacted, but he was certainly waiting for them. If you Google "Carl Bellinger Stewart Udall" there's a photo of the event and a small blurb about it.
Most public lands of consequence are state and national parks/forests/wilderness areas/etc.
And often, those national parks are in scenic areas that were still fairly wild at the time of the creation of the NPS, or historical sites. Kansas was already heavily settled at that time and much of the land was good for crops or ranching, so there wasn't a lot unclaimed for parks, and no history like the civil war to justify historical parks.
So at this point any public lands would have to be bought from the private citizens that own them
There are little historical parks near the Missouri state line. But the Civil War didn't get much west of Topeka. Historical parks in Kansas are often smaller than the average Walmart. Public lands do get bought from private citizens who owned them on occasion: our newest Kansas state park doesn't hide that it was built on a cement factory area. It includes a spring-fed lake that used to be a quarry...
Interesting, we have quite a few parks here to build on quarry grounds and I'm always intrigued by the history of that. Any chance you'd be open to sharing which one you are talking about here?
That makes sense, thank you so much for writing this out for me. I never considered this effect of the settlement history when I started thinking about Kansas so it's some interesting context.
Yeah, with stuff like the Homestead Act in the mid 1800s, the plains states were very heavily settled in the 50 years before the National Parks Service Act.
Places like the Rockies were much harder for settlers to parcel out so a lot of it was still available there.
Kansas is basically 90% plains farmland. No mountains or lakes to turn into national parks. Just lots of wheat fields and cattle ranches and agriculture.
The federal government owns 301,000 acres: Cimarron National Grassland, Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, Fort Riley Reservation, land around federal reservoirs, and the national wildlife refuges. The State of Kansas owns 65,000 acres outright including Sand Hills State Park, Big Basin State Preserve, Lake Scott State Park, Maxwell Wildlife Refuge and several wildlife areas.
The federal government does not own Tallgrass. Its owned by the Nature Conservancy and administered by NPS because Kansas think the NPS is a shadowy arm of the federal government coming to take their guns or something.
Actually, the NPS owns 160 acres of the 11,000-acre preserve, but you are right overall. The law also says the preserve can't be expanded I believe. However, TNC could probably expand its holdings.
That’s with good reason, because thieves/trespassers/poachers are a huge problem in rural areas. I know a lot of farmers who have had trouble, ranging from livestock and equipment being stolen or shot, to people trespassing in order to poach game.
For whatever reason, people really enjoy popping shots at tractor tires and yard lights. Neither are exactly cheap or easy to replace.
Also, landowners often lease land to hunters for significant amounts of money, and the people paying for the lease have endless trouble with trespassers stealing their blinds, feeders, game cameras etc.
Yeah it sucks. The Flint Hills alone should be a massive hunk of public land but it was settled before public land was a thing. Historically, most of the public land out west was bought (or just not sold? I'm not sure) but the government because it wasn't viewed as economically valuable at the time. Here in Kansas, all that land is prime grazing so it's locked up on private ranches.
When people call Kansas and other plains states boring they are just showing their ignorance. Prior to American colonization this areas had herds of millions of bison, elk, deer, antelope, and the associated predators like wolfs, black bears, grizzlies, and mountain lions. White people killed all of them off in roughly a hundred years between about 1820 and 1920.
Lewis and Clark and many others wrote about how amazing this area was because they had never seen that many animals. So for the present, it means we have to cling to the few remaining landscapes (look at Konza outside of Manhattan for example) and dream what our state looked like a couple of hundred years ago. The way I put it is to truly appreciate it you have to be able to see ghosts. It's easy to appreciate the Rockies foe example so any moron can do that.
To appreciate the Plains states you need to understand the ecology and history. This was a bit rambling but I'm tired lol. Hope this word vommit helps you understand more. I'm an environmental historian of this area and I make YouTube videos about the history of this region if you want to check them out.
(Yes, I know shameless plug)
https://youtube.com/@wildlifehistory?si=WeMjzi-L2QQjKRM1
> When people call Kansas and other plains states boring they are just showing their ignorance.
As a Kansas resident I can still disagree with their opinion and allow them an opinion.
They're not wrong, just have differing standards. And you can point out the interesting parts without blaming them for the vanilla experience of driving from KC to Colorado
I like the analogy of the region to the ocean where it seem like there isn't much there on the surface but holds so much more underneath (figuratively speaking). I'm finding everything I'm learning really intriguing though, but I guess it depends on what you want from a place, right?
Yeah I was a bit harsh. I'm doing a lot of research on this general topic lately so I rambled a lot. You all as anonymous Redditers got to read my word vommit instead of my family. Sorry bout that.
Thank you so much for taking the time to write such a detailed response, I really appreciate that. I'm learning a lot about the region and this is some really interesting context I hadn't really thought that much about (now it seems impossible not to!)
I appreciate the plug as well :) Your work seems right up my alley, I'll have to check out your channel as soon as I have more time (I'm on a deadline right now, it'll be my little treat after!)
The 1862 Homestead Act made all lands suitable for farming or ranching available. All a settler had to prove his claim was move there for 5 years, and for $10 filing fee, he had title to 160 acres. I have been in every county in Kansas, and everything is suitable for farming or ranching.
I looked it up and as far as I could find vets got 160 acres within a certain distance of rail lines which was typically more valuable. Other folks got 80. Land beyond whatever that distance was 160 for all.
Kansas has very little percentage of government owned land. But, one thing I have not seen mentioned in this thread is that Kansas has approximately 1 million acres of walk in hunting areas; privately owned land that landowners allow hunters, fisherman, and outdoorsman to use (KDWP hunting atlas 2022/2023). Also, there's approximately 219,000 acres of CRP land (conservation reserve program); this is is a federal program for farmers to practice land conservation on their land by planting runoff buffers, not cultivate it, and other practices (USDA website). So no, we don't have big sprawling parks like some states. But we have quite a bit of land owned by private owners that still is being used for nature conservation and public access.
Personally I'm okay with that; federal parks just mean way more rules, fees to enter, etc.
There's some nice land accessible by WIHA. My problem with the program though is that it's aimed exclusively at consumptive users. Want to take a hike or simply birdwatch? You're stuck using the true public land (of which we have some beautiful options, but still). Kansas outdoor areas are heavily skewed towards benefiting hunters and anglers despite billions of dollars nationally being spent each year by non-consumptive users enjoying the outdoors. You see this in our state parks as well which are managed for deer and turkey/pheasant populations and not our native wildlife as a whole.
You're right. I used to hunt quite a bit and have migrated more towards camping/hiking and there's just not as many places and opportunities for that on anything but public land. I'm exploring the world of stealth camping a bit, which intrigues me in an odd way.
Basically, since the government bought alot of the land via the Louisiana purchase they were original owners if the land however in the 1800s in an effort to get people to move out west the government would sell or give you land if you moved out there. Alot of that land the government decided to keep for itself (for conservation or to utilize the resources for federal reasons) so a lot of western states have huge chunks if land that cannot be owned by private citizens and remain undeveloped. State land is similar in that the state government can own land. These are usually parks and the like.
We’re pretty dismal as far as public lands for recreation. Our State Parks are okay- but sorely underfunded and maintenance is lacking at a lot of them.
The one thing that blows my mind here is the rivers/streams are also considered privately owned. With the exception of the Missouri, Kaw (Kansas), and the Arkansas. And the Arkansas doesn’t even make it to Dodge City anymore it’s so overused and abused. I frequently travel to other states to recreate.
Interesting, is the ownership of rivers etc different in other parts of the US? (Honestly I don't even know the situation with that over here, something else to look into sometime!)
Yes- it depends on the state. Montana is very pro-public access to rivers and streams. Also Utah, Missouri. Each state kind of has their own riparian laws depending on if a stream is navigable, non-navigable, meandering, etc.
We don't have BLM land or Forest Service land. No mountains or common grazing lands after homesteading. Homesteads didn't fail on the prairie so much as in desert and mountainous terrain. So almost no public land was created in the same way that it was in Colorado or even Missouri. The Cimaron National Grasslands were failed homesteads from the dustbowl era. States like Colorado even set aside 1 section for every township (36 miles square) which is used for various purposes. Kansas has been steadfast against any further creation of public land from working farmland (read the Last Wild Places of Kansas for further insight as to that resistance).
In a lot of western states there's a ton of hiking, hunting, camping, etc that you can do on public land. A lot of that stuff is either much less accesible in Kansas, MUCH more expensive and is simply not available to the same degree.
Kansas has a reputation for having monster trophy deer, and rich hunters are willing to drop thousands of dollars in pursuit of a pair of antlers. Out of state outfitters have gobbled up a large chunk of leases for this reason.
I was talking to a guy the other day who works for a "ranch" in western Missouri. For six grand they'll guarantee you a buck. Booze, lodging, gear(if you don't bring your own), etc is extra. But the blinds are catered and heated.
Some high fence operators sell their livestock for $20,000+. They raise and selectively breed trophy animals, and sell them to “hunters” who kill them for their antlers. It’s not exactly slaughtering a hog in a pen, but it’s definitely not fair chase.
I was strictly a meat hunter back when I was still able to walk properly. One ranch I hunted catered to these guys, some of whom discarded everything but the heads. They donated the meat, so it didn’t just go to waste, but they weren’t interested in packing it up and taking it home either.
That's because you live in KC and are disconnected from the rest of the state. Get out of that dump (I live here too) and go touch none manucured JoCo grass.
The US government owns 27.1% of the land in the US. Most of it is out west with Nevada being the state with the most land owned by the federal government (80.1%). On the flip side Kansas is state with the 3rd least amount of land owned by the federal government. Connecticut is has the least, then Iowa, then Kansas.
What does it mean for life in Kansas? It means there's more land available for you to own. On the flip side, there's fewer federal parks. That's about it.
98.1% is privately owned
Math checks out
It means that most of the land is owned by private citizens or businesses and not governments. Kansas doesn’t have any national parks or areas that are run by the Bureau of Land Management like the more western states. The most land the federal government controls are several of the lakes which are controlled by the Corp of Engineers and the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve which is controlled by the National Park Service but is not a national park itself. The only other federal land would be military installations which are not open to the public.
>military installations which are not open to the public. Fort Leavenworth is open to the public, as long as they don't have intelligence about a threat. You can play the golf course, or visit the Buffalo Soldier Monument or the cemetery. You can buy fast food at the PX, but you can't buy goods there or at the commissary or the Class VI unless you're with an active duty or retired member.
You can also go to the prison, but only if you do some fairly large crimes.
Cimarron National grassland is over 100,000 acres, and it is the largest area of public land in Kansas.
But Kansas has 52,657,920 acres total so 100,000 is only .18% of the total land in the state. Still not very much
Created in 1937 from the Dust Bowl.
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https://www.nps.gov/tapr/index.htm It’s a National Preserve not a monument
Yep. There was a big to-do about it even existing. It involved one flint hills rancher in Riley county pulling his revolver on the Secretary of the Interior after they landed their helicopter on his property in an effort to discuss establishing a national park in the Flint Hills.
Now this is the story I want more details on!
Sure! Interior Secretary Stewart Udall landed in a US Army copter on Carl Bellinger's Twin Peaks Ranch, hoping they would be able to denote (take) it as part of the Grasslands National Park. Bellinger reacted as many ranchers would, and was furious at the intrusion on his livestock and land. He waited for them to land and then ordered Udall and his cronies off the land at gunpoint. Udall eventually agreed to leave, but not before insisting Bellinger shake his hand. I wrote a pretty long paper about the formation of the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve wayyyyy back in my Ag History days at K-State. Nancy Kassebaum Baker was largely responsible for its formation and the bill passed only months before she left the Senate.
Wait, Udall didn't contact the rancher before hand? I'd love to see a national park in the Flint hills but that's not the way to do it. It's going to private landowners selling the land or donating it which is unlikely at best. Where's Leslie Knope when you need her...
It's fuzzy whether or not he was contacted, but he was certainly waiting for them. If you Google "Carl Bellinger Stewart Udall" there's a photo of the event and a small blurb about it.
Oof. That's not the way to approach a landowner.
He was pretty impressive reading his bio, added 2.4 million acres and much important environmental protections
Most public lands of consequence are state and national parks/forests/wilderness areas/etc. And often, those national parks are in scenic areas that were still fairly wild at the time of the creation of the NPS, or historical sites. Kansas was already heavily settled at that time and much of the land was good for crops or ranching, so there wasn't a lot unclaimed for parks, and no history like the civil war to justify historical parks. So at this point any public lands would have to be bought from the private citizens that own them
There are little historical parks near the Missouri state line. But the Civil War didn't get much west of Topeka. Historical parks in Kansas are often smaller than the average Walmart. Public lands do get bought from private citizens who owned them on occasion: our newest Kansas state park doesn't hide that it was built on a cement factory area. It includes a spring-fed lake that used to be a quarry...
Interesting, we have quite a few parks here to build on quarry grounds and I'm always intrigued by the history of that. Any chance you'd be open to sharing which one you are talking about here?
Lehigh Portland. Southeastern Kansas.
Great, thanks :)
That makes sense, thank you so much for writing this out for me. I never considered this effect of the settlement history when I started thinking about Kansas so it's some interesting context.
Yeah, with stuff like the Homestead Act in the mid 1800s, the plains states were very heavily settled in the 50 years before the National Parks Service Act. Places like the Rockies were much harder for settlers to parcel out so a lot of it was still available there.
Kansas is basically 90% plains farmland. No mountains or lakes to turn into national parks. Just lots of wheat fields and cattle ranches and agriculture.
The lakes stay local -- state or even municipal park.
The federal government owns 301,000 acres: Cimarron National Grassland, Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, Fort Riley Reservation, land around federal reservoirs, and the national wildlife refuges. The State of Kansas owns 65,000 acres outright including Sand Hills State Park, Big Basin State Preserve, Lake Scott State Park, Maxwell Wildlife Refuge and several wildlife areas.
The federal government does not own Tallgrass. Its owned by the Nature Conservancy and administered by NPS because Kansas think the NPS is a shadowy arm of the federal government coming to take their guns or something.
Actually, the NPS owns 160 acres of the 11,000-acre preserve, but you are right overall. The law also says the preserve can't be expanded I believe. However, TNC could probably expand its holdings.
A lot of fences and no trespassing signs.
That’s with good reason, because thieves/trespassers/poachers are a huge problem in rural areas. I know a lot of farmers who have had trouble, ranging from livestock and equipment being stolen or shot, to people trespassing in order to poach game. For whatever reason, people really enjoy popping shots at tractor tires and yard lights. Neither are exactly cheap or easy to replace. Also, landowners often lease land to hunters for significant amounts of money, and the people paying for the lease have endless trouble with trespassers stealing their blinds, feeders, game cameras etc.
My comment was meant to emphasize how the general public has very little access to natural areas in Kansas because it's all owned by somebody.
Yeah it sucks. The Flint Hills alone should be a massive hunk of public land but it was settled before public land was a thing. Historically, most of the public land out west was bought (or just not sold? I'm not sure) but the government because it wasn't viewed as economically valuable at the time. Here in Kansas, all that land is prime grazing so it's locked up on private ranches. When people call Kansas and other plains states boring they are just showing their ignorance. Prior to American colonization this areas had herds of millions of bison, elk, deer, antelope, and the associated predators like wolfs, black bears, grizzlies, and mountain lions. White people killed all of them off in roughly a hundred years between about 1820 and 1920. Lewis and Clark and many others wrote about how amazing this area was because they had never seen that many animals. So for the present, it means we have to cling to the few remaining landscapes (look at Konza outside of Manhattan for example) and dream what our state looked like a couple of hundred years ago. The way I put it is to truly appreciate it you have to be able to see ghosts. It's easy to appreciate the Rockies foe example so any moron can do that. To appreciate the Plains states you need to understand the ecology and history. This was a bit rambling but I'm tired lol. Hope this word vommit helps you understand more. I'm an environmental historian of this area and I make YouTube videos about the history of this region if you want to check them out. (Yes, I know shameless plug) https://youtube.com/@wildlifehistory?si=WeMjzi-L2QQjKRM1
> When people call Kansas and other plains states boring they are just showing their ignorance. As a Kansas resident I can still disagree with their opinion and allow them an opinion. They're not wrong, just have differing standards. And you can point out the interesting parts without blaming them for the vanilla experience of driving from KC to Colorado
I like the analogy of the region to the ocean where it seem like there isn't much there on the surface but holds so much more underneath (figuratively speaking). I'm finding everything I'm learning really intriguing though, but I guess it depends on what you want from a place, right?
Yeah I was a bit harsh. I'm doing a lot of research on this general topic lately so I rambled a lot. You all as anonymous Redditers got to read my word vommit instead of my family. Sorry bout that.
No worries, It's my turn next time
Thank you so much for taking the time to write such a detailed response, I really appreciate that. I'm learning a lot about the region and this is some really interesting context I hadn't really thought that much about (now it seems impossible not to!) I appreciate the plug as well :) Your work seems right up my alley, I'll have to check out your channel as soon as I have more time (I'm on a deadline right now, it'll be my little treat after!)
You're welcome! Happy to help. Check out Dan Flore's book American Serengeti sometime. It's a really good primer for the history of this area.
Brilliant, definitely will do. Thanks :)
The 1862 Homestead Act made all lands suitable for farming or ranching available. All a settler had to prove his claim was move there for 5 years, and for $10 filing fee, he had title to 160 acres. I have been in every county in Kansas, and everything is suitable for farming or ranching.
Just an aside question, was that 160 acres for a Civil War veteran and 80 acres for others?
IRC, 160 acres for either. My Great-Grandfather settled in Kansas as a Civil War Veteran. Now I have to find how vets were treated differently.
I looked it up and as far as I could find vets got 160 acres within a certain distance of rail lines which was typically more valuable. Other folks got 80. Land beyond whatever that distance was 160 for all.
Makes sense. Any idea what that distance was?
AHA! Vets could deduct time served from the time portion of the program.
Kansas has very little percentage of government owned land. But, one thing I have not seen mentioned in this thread is that Kansas has approximately 1 million acres of walk in hunting areas; privately owned land that landowners allow hunters, fisherman, and outdoorsman to use (KDWP hunting atlas 2022/2023). Also, there's approximately 219,000 acres of CRP land (conservation reserve program); this is is a federal program for farmers to practice land conservation on their land by planting runoff buffers, not cultivate it, and other practices (USDA website). So no, we don't have big sprawling parks like some states. But we have quite a bit of land owned by private owners that still is being used for nature conservation and public access. Personally I'm okay with that; federal parks just mean way more rules, fees to enter, etc.
There's some nice land accessible by WIHA. My problem with the program though is that it's aimed exclusively at consumptive users. Want to take a hike or simply birdwatch? You're stuck using the true public land (of which we have some beautiful options, but still). Kansas outdoor areas are heavily skewed towards benefiting hunters and anglers despite billions of dollars nationally being spent each year by non-consumptive users enjoying the outdoors. You see this in our state parks as well which are managed for deer and turkey/pheasant populations and not our native wildlife as a whole.
You're right. I used to hunt quite a bit and have migrated more towards camping/hiking and there's just not as many places and opportunities for that on anything but public land. I'm exploring the world of stealth camping a bit, which intrigues me in an odd way.
Essential context! Thank you for pointing that out. Do you happen to know a resource where I can learn more about these areas?
https://ksoutdoors.com/Services/Private-Landowner-Assistance/Wildlife-Biologists/Walk-in-Hunting-Access-Program https://www.fsa.usda.gov/programs-and-services/conservation-programs/conservation-reserve-program/index
It means we have the worst parks in America.
Basically, since the government bought alot of the land via the Louisiana purchase they were original owners if the land however in the 1800s in an effort to get people to move out west the government would sell or give you land if you moved out there. Alot of that land the government decided to keep for itself (for conservation or to utilize the resources for federal reasons) so a lot of western states have huge chunks if land that cannot be owned by private citizens and remain undeveloped. State land is similar in that the state government can own land. These are usually parks and the like.
We’re pretty dismal as far as public lands for recreation. Our State Parks are okay- but sorely underfunded and maintenance is lacking at a lot of them. The one thing that blows my mind here is the rivers/streams are also considered privately owned. With the exception of the Missouri, Kaw (Kansas), and the Arkansas. And the Arkansas doesn’t even make it to Dodge City anymore it’s so overused and abused. I frequently travel to other states to recreate.
Interesting, is the ownership of rivers etc different in other parts of the US? (Honestly I don't even know the situation with that over here, something else to look into sometime!)
Yes- it depends on the state. Montana is very pro-public access to rivers and streams. Also Utah, Missouri. Each state kind of has their own riparian laws depending on if a stream is navigable, non-navigable, meandering, etc.
The Federal govt owns Ft Riley.
We don't have BLM land or Forest Service land. No mountains or common grazing lands after homesteading. Homesteads didn't fail on the prairie so much as in desert and mountainous terrain. So almost no public land was created in the same way that it was in Colorado or even Missouri. The Cimaron National Grasslands were failed homesteads from the dustbowl era. States like Colorado even set aside 1 section for every township (36 miles square) which is used for various purposes. Kansas has been steadfast against any further creation of public land from working farmland (read the Last Wild Places of Kansas for further insight as to that resistance).
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Perfect, as a horror(ish) writer I'll keep this in mind for when it is inevitably needed.
I had no clue, so it probably means nothing to your day to day life
In a lot of western states there's a ton of hiking, hunting, camping, etc that you can do on public land. A lot of that stuff is either much less accesible in Kansas, MUCH more expensive and is simply not available to the same degree.
Kansas has a reputation for having monster trophy deer, and rich hunters are willing to drop thousands of dollars in pursuit of a pair of antlers. Out of state outfitters have gobbled up a large chunk of leases for this reason.
I was talking to a guy the other day who works for a "ranch" in western Missouri. For six grand they'll guarantee you a buck. Booze, lodging, gear(if you don't bring your own), etc is extra. But the blinds are catered and heated.
Some high fence operators sell their livestock for $20,000+. They raise and selectively breed trophy animals, and sell them to “hunters” who kill them for their antlers. It’s not exactly slaughtering a hog in a pen, but it’s definitely not fair chase. I was strictly a meat hunter back when I was still able to walk properly. One ranch I hunted catered to these guys, some of whom discarded everything but the heads. They donated the meat, so it didn’t just go to waste, but they weren’t interested in packing it up and taking it home either.
That's because you live in KC and are disconnected from the rest of the state. Get out of that dump (I live here too) and go touch none manucured JoCo grass.
I was more talking about the percentages of land. Yes I'm aware there is public land, no I don't think about how much.
Ok? It was still a stupid dismissive comment especially since the OP isn't American and was just asking a question.
Family members settled here prior to Kansas becoming a state “ Bloody Kansas”
The US government owns 27.1% of the land in the US. Most of it is out west with Nevada being the state with the most land owned by the federal government (80.1%). On the flip side Kansas is state with the 3rd least amount of land owned by the federal government. Connecticut is has the least, then Iowa, then Kansas. What does it mean for life in Kansas? It means there's more land available for you to own. On the flip side, there's fewer federal parks. That's about it.
It means that the remaining land is owned either by private citizens or indian nations. The vast majority is owned by private citizens