Metal Detecting in Texas

1. The rule, in full

Texas – Natural Resources Code ch. 191 (Antiquities Code)

Read from the Texas Constitution and Statutes published by the Texas Legislative Council at statutes.capitol.texas.gov, Natural Resources Code chapter 191 in full, 36,043 characters extracted; sections 191.091, 191.092, 191.131, 191.132, 191.171 and 191.172 read in text. Checked 7 Oct 2026.

SWEEP FINDING, 8 Oct 2026: the parks rule was never read, and it names metal detectors

This entry rested entirely on the Antiquities Code, Natural Resources Code chapter 191, which does not mention metal detectors. The second sweep dimension asks whether such an entry has ever had the parks agency's own regulation read. Texas had not, and the rule exists:

31 TAC 59.134(i), "Metal detector": "It is an offense for any person to operate or use a metal detector, except as authorized by permit."

THIS RULE IS IN MOTION. Read both versions before you plan a trip.

The adopted text requires a permit. A proposed amendment would replace that with the park superintendent's authorisation, which is a materially lower bar – a conversation at the park office rather than an application.

The proposal appears in the Texas Register's bracket convention, where bracketed words are struck: "except as authorized by the park superintendent or designee [permit]".

Why this page cannot tell you which one is in force. The Secretary of State's Texas Administrative Code viewer was retired during 2025 and its replacement is an interactive portal this project cannot read, so 59.134 was read from the department's own publication of its park rules rather than from the consolidated code. Settling whether an amendment has been adopted is precisely what a consolidated code is for. The detail is below under [where this was read from](#where-this-was-read-from).

The useful part: your move is the same under either version. Ask the park superintendent. Under the adopted text the park issues the permit; under the proposal the superintendent authorises you directly. Either way the conversation is with the same person, and the thing worth knowing is that if you are told "you need a permit" and the amendment has since been adopted, the superintendent can simply authorise it. Ask when you call whether the rule has changed.

A dedicated subsection, in the parks chapter, naming the thing. It is the provision that actually governs a detectorist in a Texas state park, and this page did not have it. That makes the sweep dimension 4 for 4 – Washington's WAC 352-32-235, Connecticut's 23-4-1(1), Wisconsin's NR 45 and now this.

And two neighbouring subsections bear on the recovery rather than the sweep:

59.134(l)(2), "Geological features": "It is an offense for any person to take, remove, destroy, deface, tamper with, or disturb any rock, earth, soil, gem, mineral, fossil, or other geological deposit except by permit issued by the director."

59.134(l)(3), "Cultural resources": "It is an offense for any person to take, remove, destroy, deface, tamper with, disturb, or otherwise adversely impact any prehistoric or historic resource, including but not limited to, buildings, structures, cultural features, rock art, or artifacts, except by written order of the director."

Note that (l)(2) reaches disturbing earth or soil on its own terms, with no archaeological element at all, and the authorising officer is the director rather than the park. So in a Texas state park the detector needs authorisation under (i) and the digging is separately reached by (l)(2).

Scope: TPWD land, not municipal. The chapter is adopted under Parks and Wildlife Code 13.101, which gives the commission authority over "state parks, historic sites, scientific areas, or forts, including encompassed waters, under the control of the department". It does not reach a city park – which is exactly why chapter 191 still matters here, because that one does.

Penalty: Parks and Wildlife Code 13.112. "A person who violates a regulation adopted under Subchapter B of this chapter commits an offense that is a Class C Parks and Wildlife Code misdemeanor", which the department states as up to $500. Modest, and on the same order as the Antiquities Code's own $50 to $1,000.

Where this was read from, and why it is not the Texas Administrative Code

Read from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department's own publication of its park rules, "Texas State Parks Rules and Regulations", tpwd.texas.gov/publications/pwdpubs/media/pwd_br_p4000_0000a.pdf, 8 Oct 2026. The document states that "these regulations were adopted by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission on January 21, 2016" and is marked UPDATED 2021.

This is the promulgating agency publishing its own rule, and it is NOT the consolidated code, which could not be reached. Said plainly because METHODOLOGY rule 11 requires the current consolidated code and this entry does not meet that standard for 59.134. The Secretary of State's Texas Administrative Code viewer has been retired: texreg.sos.state.tx.us now answers every path, including the legacy readtac$ext.TacPage deep links, with a "This Site Has Moved" stub, and the replacement at texas-sos.appianportalsgov.com/rules-and-meetings is an interactive portal whose data endpoint returns {"message":"Client not supported"} to a plain GET or POST. Recorded in METHODOLOGY 11g as the ninth blocked publisher and the first whose cause is a migration rather than a block.

A pending amendment, and its status is unverified. The Commission's work-session agenda for 27 to 28 May 2026 carries a proposed amendment to this subsection, in the Texas Register's bracket convention where bracketed text is struck:

"(i) Metal detector. It is an offense for any person to operate or use a metal detector, except as authorized by the park superintendent or designee [permit]."

So the proposal replaces the permit with the superintendent's authorisation, which is a lower and more practical bar. Whether it has been adopted is not established. The August 2026 agenda lists a "Texas Regulatory Efficiency Office Rules – Recommended Adoption of Proposed Changes" item, and the May preamble says these amendments implement that office's recommendations, but the agenda items checked do not reproduce the section text, and the consolidated code cannot be read to settle it.

What a reader should do is the same under either text: ask the park superintendent. Under the adopted text a permit is issued by the park; under the proposal the superintendent authorises directly. The practical route does not change, and the page should not pretend to a certainty the sourcing does not support.

Two instruments, two different jobs

Do not merge them. A reader in a Texas state park is governed by 59.134 and needs the park's authorisation. A reader in a city park is outside 59.134 entirely, and what reaches them is chapter 191's landmark scheme on archaeological sites – not a prohibition on detecting.

Resolved 7 Oct 2026: the sections are pinned, and no reply was needed

This entry previously pinned no section number to either quotation and carried no Read-from sentence – the weakest-sourced entry in the directory, and the defect was stated on the page rather than left for a tool to notice. It is resolved, and the way it resolved is worth recording.

A request went to the Texas Historical Commission in early October and has not been answered. It did not need to be. The blocked publisher was never the statutes. Wyoming had just shown that wyoleg.gov/ARules/ answers every filename with the same stub while wyoleg.gov/statutes/ serves a clean PDF, so the eight blocked publishers were re-tested path by path rather than treated as whole hosts. Texas's statutes were open.

One honest note on that test. The first fetch returned HTTP 200 and 250,874 bytes and was reported as open before anything was extracted. It was an Angular shell: 1,443 characters of navigation chrome and no chapter. The content came back only on render=true. A 200 and a large byte count are not a read – METHODOLOGY rule 5, and it caught me out on the way to fixing it.

The designation question, answered by quoting it

The question this entry has carried since September was whether a qualifying site is already a landmark or merely eligible to become one. The statute says both, in the same clause, and that is the answer: the ambiguity is the statute's.

Operative text, 191.092(a):

"Sites, objects, buildings, artifacts, implements, and locations of historical, archeological, scientific, or educational interest, including those pertaining to prehistoric and historical American Indians or aboriginal campsites, dwellings, and habitation sites, their artifacts and implements of culture, as well as archeological sites of every character that are located in, on, or under the surface of any land belonging to the State of Texas or to any county, city, or political subdivision of the state are state archeological landmarks and are eligible for designation."

Scope: reaches municipal land, named expressly.

And the provision a detectorist should read first, 191.091, which this entry did not have:

"Sunken or abandoned pre-twentieth century ships and wrecks of the sea, and any part or the contents of them, and all treasure imbedded in the earth, located in, on, or under the surface of land belonging to the State of Texas, including its tidelands, submerged land, and the beds of its rivers and the sea within jurisdiction of the State of Texas, are declared to be state archeological landmarks and are eligible for designation."

"All treasure imbedded in the earth" on state land is declared a state archeological landmark. That is as close as any statute in this project comes to naming what a detectorist is actually looking for, and it was absent from this page.

What then follows, 191.131(b):

"No person, firm, or corporation may conduct an operation on any landmark without first obtaining a permit and having the permit in his or its possession at the site of the operation, or conduct the operation in violation of the provisions of the permit."

Note the possession requirement: the permit has to be on you at the site, not merely granted.

Rock art and monuments, 191.132:

"(a) No person may intentionally and knowingly deface American Indian or aboriginal paintings, hieroglyphics, or other marks or carvings on rock or elsewhere that pertain to early American Indian or aboriginal habitation of the country. (b) A person who is not the owner shall not wilfully injure, disfigure, remove, or destroy a historical structure, monument, marker…"

The penalty, and it is modest

191.171:

"(a) A person violating any of the provisions of this chapter is guilty of a misdemeanor, and on conviction shall be punished by a fine of not less than $50 and not more than $1,000, by confinement in jail for not more than 30 days, or by both. (b) Each day of continued violation of any provision of this chapter constitutes a separate offense for which the offender may be punished."

A misdemeanour, $50 to $1,000, up to 30 days. Worth stating plainly because Texas is widely written about as though its Antiquities Code carried severe exposure, and the per-day multiplier in (b) is the part that can actually add up. Separately, 191.172 lets the Attorney General seek restraining orders and injunctive relief in addition to any criminal penalty.

What chapter 191 does NOT do. It does not mention metal detectors; the chapter was searched and the term does not appear. It reaches conducting an operation on a landmark without a permit, and defacing or removing the things named in 191.132. Detecting as such is not an offence under it.

Scope text, Subchapter D:

"…as well as archeological sites of every character that are located in, on, or under the surface of any land belonging to the State of Texas or to any county, city, or political subdivision of the state are state archeological landmarks and are eligible for designation."

"Political subdivision" defined:

"means a local governmental entity created and operating under the laws of this state, including a city, county, school district, or special district…"

Scope: reaches municipal land.

What it actually regulates: survey and discovery, excavation, restoration, demolition and study of state archeological landmarks, by permit from the Texas Antiquities Committee. Note the phrase "eligible for designation" – whether protection attaches automatically or on designation is a question for a lawyer, not for me, and the entry should say so rather than assert either reading.

What it does NOT prohibit: metal detecting. The code does not mention detectors.

Directory entry should read: archaeological sites on city and county land in Texas are state archeological landmarks, and disturbing one requires a permit. Not that detecting is illegal in Texas city parks.

2. Cities in Texas that publish a rule

7 cities in Texas publish a rule we can quote, out of 235 checked.

Of the 235 checked, 129 had pages on the city’s own site that we found and read. For the other 106 we could not locate a municipal source, so nothing is claimed about them either way.

3. County rules

County rules exist in Texas, and they govern county land only. 8 county rules surfaced while checking cities in this state. Each was read and then set aside, because a county park rule does not answer whether a city park allows detecting, and it is not the state rule either. They are listed because their existence is the useful fact: if you are in a county park, a separate rule probably applies to you.

2 of these 8 name their county in the text that was read; the rest name only “county park” or “county parks”, so the source is given instead of a county name. A county is never inferred from a web address.

4. Cities checked - no published rule

228 cities in Texas were checked and have no published rule on this page. Of those, 220 returned no rule, and 8 did return something that has not been published – mostly rules that turned out to govern county land, which are in the county section above. A city here is not a city where detecting is allowed. It is a city whose own published material did not answer the question.

All 228 were checked on 13 September 2026, in one sweep, so that date applies to every row. 1 row was discounted because the document retrieved belonged to a different place, so no rule is claimed for the city named. 4 have no municipal site recorded and are shown without a link rather than dropped, because dropping them would understate what was checked.

5. Land this page does not cover

This page answers for Texas state land, and for city and county land where the state rule reaches it. Several other kinds of ground are not covered here, and naming them is more honest than letting a reader assume the page is complete.

Tribal land. This directory does not cover it, and will not.

There are 574 federally recognised tribal nations. Each is a sovereign jurisdiction with its own law, its own permitting, its own enforcement and its own cultural-resource provisions, and none of them is answered by a state's code or by any federal rule quoted on these pages. A one-line instruction to "get tribal permission" would be worse than this paragraph, because it implies one process and one authority where there are 574. If you are on or near tribal land, the governing law is that nation's, and the place to ask is that nation's own offices. Nothing on this page applies there.

BLM land is covered, partly, in its own place. The Bureau of Land Management holds about 245 million acres and the federal rule names metal detectors and permits them, which is the opposite of the national park rule. See BLM land: the detector is named, and permitted. That page covers the base regulation; it does not yet cover the supplementary rules individual BLM State Directors issue for particular field offices.

Named and not examined. These are recorded so their absence is visible rather than silent. No claim is made about any of them:

• Military withdrawn land, including ranges and training areas.
• Bureau of Reclamation land, which surrounds a great many reservoirs.
• Water district and irrigation district land.
• Wilderness, Wilderness Study Areas and National Conservation Areas, which carry designations of their own. And one general point about signs. The commonest piece of reasoning in this subject is "there was no sign, so it was allowed." Arizona's State Land Department answers it in writing, in condition 2 of its own Recreational Permit terms:

"You will comply with all laws, rules, regulations and ordinances. Posting is not required for these provisions to be enforceable."

That is Arizona's sentence about Arizona's provisions and this directory does not present it as the law of any other state. But the proposition it states is the one to carry: nothing read for this project makes a published rule's enforceability depend on a sign at the boundary. Where posting does matter, a specific provision says so, and that provision is quoted on the page where it occurs.