Custer County, SD Mining Claims & Land Ownership Map
Current BLM claim data, land ownership layers, and rockhounding-ready backcountry navigation for Custer County, SD — built for the field.
Custer County, SD Mining Claims & Land Ownership Map
Current BLM claim data, land ownership layers, and rockhounding-ready backcountry navigation for Custer County, SD — built for the field.
Custer County occupies the southern Black Hills of South Dakota, framing a historic mineral landscape that stretches from Custer State Park and Harney Peak down through the French Creek basin and out toward the eastern agate badlands. Celebrated as the birthplace of the 1874 Black Hills gold rush and internationally famous for Fairburn agates, the county attracts gold panners, detectorists, and lapidary collectors.
Public domain lands managed by the Black Hills National Forest (Hell Canyon Ranger District) and the Bureau of Land Management provide extensive territory for backcountry exploration. Geologically, Custer County features a complex Precambrian core of metamorphic schists, quartzites, and granitic pegmatites bounded by uplifted sedimentary hogbacks.
Hydrothermal solutions injected gold-bearing quartz veins into schists along French Creek and Tehama Gulch, while weathering eroded these veins into rich placer gravels. Meanwhile, granitic pegmatites produced fine specimens of rose quartz, beryl, tourmaline, tantalite, and mica. To the east, silica-saturated fluids in limestone and shale formations created world-famous Fairburn agates, prairie agates, and chalcedony geodes.
Navigating Custer County prospecting demands exact spatial awareness. Active unpatented lode and placer claims line primary gold streams and pegmatite dikes, intermingling with private ranches, Custer State Park, and Wind Cave National Park land where collecting is strictly prohibited. Utilizing an active Custer County mining claims map enables prospectors and rockhounds to check live BLM MLRS records, confirm open public domain ground, and explore safely.
2,919
Current / Not-Closed Custer County, SD Claim Records
16,954
Historical Custer County, SD Claims
537
Custer County, SD Rockhound Hotspots
20,410
Total Custer County, SD Claims & Hotspots
533
Metallic Sites
4
Non-Metallic Sites
Notable finds: Quartz · Kyanite
| Material | Sites Recorded |
|---|---|
| Quartz | 3 |
| Kyanite | 1 |
2,705
Lode Claims
214
Placer Claims
| Claim Type | Current Claims |
|---|---|
| Lode Claims | 2,705 (92.7%) |
| Placer Claims | 214 (7.3%) |
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Official Prospecting Resources for Custer County, SD
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Staked Maps isn't crowd-sourced guesswork. Current and historical claim boundaries are parsed directly from the Bureau of Land Management's Mineral & Land Records System (MLRS), which replaced the legacy LR2000 mining claim system in 2021, and kept in sync with our database on a regular schedule. Rockhound Hotspots draw from the USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS), cross-referenced by material so you can see exactly what's been found at a given site. For legal filings, always confirm current status directly with your BLM state office of record; Staked Maps is a research and navigation tool, not a substitute for the official record.
Directly from the Bureau of Land Management's official MLRS (Mineral & Land Records System) case-recordation records, synced into our database on a regular schedule — not scraped or crowd-sourced.
Staked Maps displays the status reported by BLM. Records with a case disposition of Active are labeled Active; historical records come from BLM's closed-claims dataset. These statuses are research information, not a Staked Maps legal determination of claim validity, discovery, ownership or compliance. Verify the current record through MLRS before acting on it.
Free users can search by county. Paid plans add search by claim serial number, plus each claim's full legal (aliquot) description and BLM records link.
Staked Maps currently tracks 2,919 current federal mining claim/site records and 16,954 historical claim records from BLM MLRS, plus 537 Custer County, SD mineral-occurrence records derived from USGS MRDS.
A premium map layer of documented mineral occurrences, prospects and mines sourced from USGS MRDS and labeled by material where available. These records are research leads, not a directory of verified public collecting sites.
Yes — the live map covers all of South Dakota, not just Custer County. Other South Dakota counties with a dedicated page: Lawrence County, Pennington County and Meade County.
Custer County Register of Deeds Office is Custer County, SD's primary office for filing and researching mining claims — see the Official Filing & Information Links section above for the direct link and more resources.
Regulatory and editorial content last reviewed against official records · Source: Custer County Register of Deeds Office · USGS MRDS
Information hosted on Staked Maps is compiled from publicly available data streams provided by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and relevant state geographic clearinghouses. Staked Maps accepts no liability for the content of this geospatial data, or for the consequences of any real-world exploration, land entry, or staking actions taken on the basis of the information provided via this application interface.
Staked Maps makes no warranty, expressed or implied, including the warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose, nor assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the pinpoint accuracy, reliability, completeness, latency, or programmatic utility of these geospatial data layers, or for the improper interpretation of these data grids.
These mapping layers and related graphics are visual convenience aids only; they are not legal documents and must never be used as such. The data may not be used to legally determine title, mineral ownership, valid description boundaries, jurisdictional authorities, or land restrictions in place on public or private land. Natural backcountry hazards may or may not be depicted on topographies, and land users are strictly mandated to exercise caution. Federal records are dynamic and change constantly. The end-user is exclusively responsible for validating current land classifications with local BLM field offices and managing compliance accordingly.