My family owns a small amount of acreage in the NE/4 of Section 24, Block 35, Township 4 North in Dawson County, Texas. We have recently been approached with a lease offer of $2,500/acre on a 25% royalty. I see that Ike Operating drilled the Glacier 24-1 I #2DN and Glacier 24-1 C #6DN in July 2025, they are both producing. They also drilled the Teton 24-6 E #2DN which was completed in March 2025 but is not yet producing.
These wells start in the NE/4 where we own. We haven’t received any correspondence from Ike Operating and to my knowledge we did not sign a lease with them. Does this mean we were pooled or that these are allocation wells?
I’m confused as to how a company can lease our minerals if Ike has already drilled on them. Would the company be leasing with the intent to drill too, or are they wanting to lease and get paid the royalties from the Ike wells?
These wells appear to be allocation wells. More than likely production from these wells will be allocated on a productive lateral basis, which is the percentage of the horizontal well’s productive lateral (first take point to last take point) which traverses your tract.
It looks like the Glacier 24-1 2DN has a total productive lateral length of 18,295’ with 2,538’ of that productive lateral traversing your tract.
I could be wrong, but the most likely scenario is that you are simply an unleased mineral owner and if you did not participate in the well(s) (paying your proportionate share of drilling and completion costs) you likely will be “carried” and will be entitled to your proportionate share of revenue from production once each well pays out. Once each well pays out you would receive a division order for each.
I would reach out to the operator and let them know you own a mineral interest in those lands and maybe provide them with the Mineral Deed into your family. They may want to lease your interest and at that time you can decide which route would be best either leasing or remaining a UMI owner and waiting for these wells to pay out (which isn’t guaranteed, but is likely to happen at some point).
It will not be mineral trespass if the Mineral Owner A owns a fractional interest, rather than 100% of the minerals, in the 160 acres and the oil company had leases from most or all of the other mineral owners in the 160 acres. Here the family owns only small acreage in the tract. Their options are to lease, to participate in the well as a WI or to be carried as an unleased MI until payout on a well by well basis.
Thank you for your response, I think that we are going to lease. Birch offered us $2,500/NMA, I plan on countering. I am also going to get in touch with the operator, provide a deed and see if they’d like to make a lease offer as well. Most of my leasing experience is in Oklahoma which is completely different ballgame. I appreciate your input here.