Do Mineral Rights Expire

The kinds of answer you can get

Illustrative anniversary

For a rule that counts years of nonuse from the last use, the last use date plus the period. It is the first day the nonuse condition could be met if nothing the statute counts happened since, not a loss date.

Notice window

For Ohio and North Dakota, where the period is counted back from a surface owner’s notice, the look back window and the response period once you enter the actual notice date. Without a notice, nothing has been lost by time.

Court decision

For rules that work only through a court petition, an illustrative date from which nonuse could be argued.

A different mechanism

For trusts, receiverships and historic registration rules, an explanation instead of a date.

No comparable period

Where AMR found no statute of this kind, or the rule is under review, no date at all.

When the owner of record has died or cannot be found

A dormancy clock can keep running while an interest sits with heirs nobody has identified, and a notice may go to a dead owner’s last address. After you choose a jurisdiction, the section headed Deceased or unlocated owner sets out what that jurisdiction’s law says about seven questions: how its nonuse rule treats such owners, heirs and successors, the search required, who must get notice and how, notice by publication, how an owner responds or preserves, and any court, receivership or trust for missing owners.

Each answer is labeled by what supports it: a statute, a court decision, both, a search of the provisions that found nothing on the point, or Not yet verified where AMR has not settled it. Statutes and court decisions are cited separately, and the state page quotes each passage. The section never asks for names, addresses or probate papers, never calculates a deadline from a death, and never says that a notice was valid, that someone owns an interest, or that an interest has ended. It lists the facts a title review would have to establish instead.

How dates are counted

Dates are calendar dates. Adding years keeps the month and day, and a 29 February start falls on 28 February in a common year. Days are added on the calendar, without moving weekends or holidays. Courts apply their own counting rules, so treat every date here as arithmetic to check, not a deadline to rely on. Nothing you enter leaves this page.

What counts as a last use date

The rule finder asks for the date the interest was last used, in the sense its state’s statute gives that word. Each statute lists its own events. Common ones are production or drilling on the land or in a unit that includes it, a recorded lease, conveyance or mortgage of the interest, payment of property tax on it, and a recorded statement of claim or notice to preserve it.

A recorded instrument usually counts from the date it was recorded. An event that one statute counts may not count in another, so the state pages list the exact events for each state, each with its citation.

Sources

The rule finder reads the same reviewed records as the Law Atlas, release 2026.10.1. Every rule it applies is cited on its state page with the operative words quoted, and the source register lists each source with the date it was read.

Version history

American Mineral Registry. "Dormant mineral rule finder." Version 2.1.0, rules from the U.S. Mineral Rights Law Atlas release 2026.10.1, October 6, 2026. https://americanmineralregistry.com/research/do-mineral-rights-expire

[Dormant mineral rule finder](https://americanmineralregistry.com/research/do-mineral-rights-expire), American Mineral Registry, version 2.1.0 (2026-10-06).

@software{amr_dormancy_tool_2026,
  author = {{American Mineral Registry}},
  title = {Dormant mineral rule finder},
  version = {2.1.0},
  date = {2026-10-06},
  url = {https://americanmineralregistry.com/research/do-mineral-rights-expire}
}