8 New York Posted Land Rules Hunters and Landowners Both Get Wrong

New York requires posted signs every 660 feet along a boundary line, closer together than many landowners realize.

Miss that interval, and a lot less of your property ends up legally covered than many landowners assume.

Hunters misjudge those same gaps just as often, from the opposite direction.

These are the New York posting rules that trip up landowners and hunters alike.

Note: This is general information, not legal advice. Posted-land and trespass rules are subject to change, so confirm the current requirements with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC).

1. Sign Size and Wording

New York’s posting law spells out exactly how big a sign has to be, and it’s stricter than many people assume.

A posted sign has to measure at least 11×11 inches, with the word “POSTED” or a similar warning covering at least 80 square inches of that space.

Many of the pre-printed signs sold at hardware stores come in smaller.

Size decides it.

Landowners hang whatever’s cheapest off the rack and assume the job is done.

Hunters run into a different version of the same rule.

Many figure only a sign with the literal word “POSTED” carries any legal weight, so they wave off anything else, like a “No Hunting Without Permission” sign, as a landowner’s opinion rather than an enforceable boundary.

New York’s statute treats that kind of wording exactly the same as “POSTED,” as long as it still covers the required 80 square inches.

2. 660-Foot Spacing Rule

New York’s posting law also controls how far apart those signs can sit.

Signs have to run no more than 660 feet apart along the boundary, with at least one on every side and at every corner a surveyor could point to.

That’s roughly two football fields.

A landowner who tacks up two signs at the driveway and calls it done hasn’t posted the back of the property at all.

Hunters draw the wrong conclusion from the opposite clue.

No sign in sight doesn’t mean the land isn’t posted.

It might just mean the next sign is 500 feet up the tree line.

3. Naming the Landowner on the Sign

New York’s posting statute also requires a name on the sign, not just the word “POSTED.”

Every legal sign has to carry the name and address of the owner, the tenant, or whoever else has the authority to post the land.

A blank sign from the feed store doesn’t finish the job until someone fills that part in.

Many landowners skip it, either from habit or because nobody reads the fine print.

Hunters glance right past it, treating any purple-and-white sign nailed to a post as interchangeable with the next one.

It isn’t.

A sign with no name attached gives a hunter no way to even ask permission, which is often the difference between a friendly conversation and a citation.

4. No Purple Paint Law

New York never adopted a purple paint law, even though the idea keeps showing up on trees across the state.

More than a dozen other states let landowners post with paint instead of signs.

New York isn’t one of them.

Paint alone won’t hold up.

A bill that would change that has sat stuck in committee since 2025.

Landowners who paint a boundary purple and stop there haven’t posted a thing.

Hunters who’ve hunted across the border in Pennsylvania carry the opposite assumption home.

Pennsylvania adopted its own purple paint law in 2020, so purple streaks on a tree there carry the same legal weight as a posted sign.

A hunter used to reading it that way treats New York’s purple paint the same, assuming the color itself closes the land.

It doesn’t.

New York’s trespass law runs on signs and written notice, and the color of a tree trunk doesn’t factor into it at all, no matter which side of the border a hunter learned to read it on.

5. No Sign, Not Permission

New York’s trespass law doesn’t stop at the property line where the signs run out.

A hunting license never grants entry onto private land, posted or not.

DEC’s own guidance says the same thing directly: A hunter needs the landowner’s permission to enter, whether or not the boundary is posted.

Many hunters treat an unposted tree line as an open invitation.

It isn’t one.

Landowners get it backward from their own side: Many assume posting is what creates the permission requirement in the first place.

It doesn’t.

The requirement applies whether or not a single sign ever goes up.

6. One Sign, a Blanket Rule

New York’s posting law makes a plain “POSTED” sign a blanket rule, not a narrow one.

DEC’s own guidance confirms it: A sign posted with no activity specified bars every activity at once, hunting, fishing, and trapping included.

Many landowners assume the opposite: That a bare “POSTED” sign only blocks whatever activity worried them most, usually hunting, and leaves the rest of the property open.

It doesn’t work that way.

A landowner who only wants to keep hunters out still has to say so directly on the sign, or the blanket default closes off fishing and trapping too.

Hunters misjudge the wording from the other direction.

Some figure a sign that only mentions trespassing, without the word “hunting” anywhere on it, must not apply to them.

It applies to them.

A generic “POSTED” sign closes the whole property unless the wording says otherwise.

7. Posting Rights, Landowners Only

New York law doesn’t let just anyone tack up a “POSTED” sign and call the job legitimate.

Only the owner, a lawful tenant, or someone else with documented authority over the land can post it.

Posting land without that authority is its own violation, separately spelled out in Section 11-2113 of the same law.

A neighbor who posts a shared boundary line without asking, or a hunting club that posts land it only leases part of, can run into that problem fast.

Landowners assume a family member or a caretaker can post on their behalf without anything in writing.

That’s not always true.

Hunters carry the opposite assumption: Many take it for granted that every sign they see must be legitimate simply because it’s nailed up and reads “POSTED.”

Some aren’t.

8. Yearly Sign Replacement

New York’s posting law doesn’t treat a sign as permanent once it goes up.

State law requires illegible or torn-down signs to be replaced at least once a year to keep the land legally posted.

A landowner who nailed up signs years ago and never checked on them may not be legally posted anymore.

Sun, ice, and a determined woodpecker do more damage than many landowners expect.

Many hunters take a weathered, half-legible sign at face value, figuring it still counts as long as it’s still nailed to the tree.

New York law doesn’t spell out exactly what happens the moment that year mark passes without a repair.

It doesn’t need to.

A sign nobody can read is hard to call a sign at all, posted or not.

How New York’s Liability Shield Works

New York’s General Obligations Law protects landowners who let people hunt on their land for free, whether or not that land is posted.

Under that law, a landowner owes no duty to keep the property safe for a hunter, trapper, or hiker there for recreation.

The protection holds even on land that’s wide open with no signs anywhere.

Charge even a small fee for that same access, and the protection disappears.

Landowners who post their land purely to dodge lawsuits are solving a problem the statute already handles for free.