Tax Year, Production Month, and Download Date in Texas Mineral Records

Direct answer for mineral owners

Use separate fields for a Texas mineral record’s tax year or January 1 appraisal date, its RRC production month and processed-data status, and the date someone downloaded or retrieved it. Those dates answer different questions. A retrieval date proves when the source was obtained; it does not change the period represented by the source or prove that later corrections are absent.

Key takeaways for mineral owners

• A Texas property-tax record may use a tax year and January 1 appraisal date that differ from its later publication or download date.
• RRC production records identify a production month and may change after revised, corrected, or delinquent operator reports are processed.
• Dataset update schedules and a researcher’s retrieval date are freshness evidence, not substitutes for the source period.
• A mixed packet should preserve all three date roles in separate labeled fields.
• None of those dates alone proves ownership, account accuracy, private value, offer quality, or a transaction outcome.

Three date roles, not one universal as-of date. This page is a source-labeling guide for mixed Texas mineral records. It does not identify an owner, legal description, mineral account, lease, well, decimal interest, appraisal result, tax amount, private value, offer, buyer action, deadline, or transaction outcome. MRX provides educational information and resources only and does not buy mineral rights.

The direct answer is: record the tax year or January 1 appraisal date, the RRC production month and processed-data status, and the download or retrieval date in separate fields. They describe different events. Combining them into one date can make an old period look current, make a later download look like a source effective date, or hide the possibility of later corrections.

A retrieval date proves only when the researcher obtained the source. It does not replace the source’s stated period, establish that the record was complete on that day, or convert a public record into an owner-specific conclusion.

The three-date crosswalk

Date role	What to copy	What it answers	What it does not prove
Tax year or January 1 appraisal date	The year and effective date shown by the appraisal source	The ad valorem period the record addresses	Private sale value, offer quality, or current account correctness
RRC production month and processed-data status	The reported month plus the source’s loaded-through or snapshot wording	The production period represented and the processing context visible at retrieval	Finality, ownership, royalty entitlement, or future production
Download or retrieval date	The date and time the source was obtained, plus URL or file path	When the researcher captured that source version	The source period, publication date, effective date, or absence of later corrections

Keep an additional field for the issuer, dataset or report name, exact identifier, and any status label such as preliminary, amended, corrected, or loaded through. The date fields become useful only when the record identity is preserved beside them.

Tax year and January 1 belong to the appraisal lane

The Texas Comptroller Valuing Property page says that, with limited exceptions, appraisal districts appraise taxable property at market value as of January 1. That statement supplies the statewide property-tax context for an appraisal date.

The Property Tax Data Reports and Surveys page separately explains that Comptroller reports use data and values submitted by appraisal districts. It describes annual or biennial report scopes and, for ADRS, the districts studied in the stated year.

Preserve four labels when using that lane:

1. the tax year shown by the source;
2. the January 1 appraisal date when the source applies it;
3. the report or worksheet publication identity; and
4. the date your family retrieved the page or file.

Those labels should not be collapsed. A report published or downloaded later can still describe an earlier tax year and a January 1 appraisal date. For the separate question of why a tax appraisal and private estimate may differ, use Why Doesn’t My Texas Mineral Tax Value Match a Sale Estimate?. Article 297 does not repeat that comparison.

Production month belongs to the RRC reporting lane

The Texas RRC Oil and Gas Production Data page describes production information as reported to the Commission by Texas operators and routes users to monthly products and production queries.

The RRC Production Data Query System FAQ adds the timing boundary. It says production reports are due after the production month, explains an online reporting lag, calls production information a snapshot in time, and says revised, corrected, or delinquent reports can change the data.

That means a record index should preserve both the production month and the processed-data context visible when retrieved. A family should not relabel a later download as the production month or describe a snapshot as permanently final.

Use Texas RRC Production by Lease: Retrieval-Provenance Worksheet for the query-specific route. This article owns only the cross-system date labels, not the RRC query path or result fields.

Download date is provenance, not the source period

The RRC Data Sets Available for Download page lists different update schedules for different products, including monthly schedules and a production-query dump updated on the last Saturday of each month. Those schedules belong to the named datasets; they are not one universal freshness promise for every RRC page or file.

Recording a download date is still useful. It lets another reviewer know when the source was captured and which version may need a freshness check. But the date is researcher-created provenance. Unless the issuer itself labels that date as a publication, effective, reporting, or revision date, do not assign it one of those roles.

A compact retrieval label can use this structure:

• Issuer: agency or district
• Source: exact page, dataset, worksheet, or report
• Identifier: lease, district, account, file, or route identifier shown
• Source period: tax year, production month, or not shown
• Processed-data status: loaded through, preliminary, corrected, or not shown
• Retrieved: date, time, and timezone
• Limitation: question this record cannot answer

If a source period is absent, write not shown. Do not infer it from a browser timestamp, email date, local modified date, or the day the file was downloaded.

A family packet should keep the lanes separate

When several relatives are gathering records, use one row per source object instead of one row per topic. That prevents an appraisal record, a production record, and a downloaded file from inheriting the same date by proximity.

Packet field	Example form	Stop condition
Source owner	Texas Comptroller, Texas RRC, local appraisal district, or another named issuer	Stop if the issuer is unclear
Exact source identity	Page title, dataset name, worksheet name, or file name	Stop if two documents share an informal nickname
Record identifier	District, lease, account, report, or route identifier shown	Stop if the identifier was copied from another source
Source-period date	Tax year, January 1 date, or production month as displayed	Write not shown rather than guessing
Processing or version label	Preliminary, corrected, amended, loaded through, or not shown	Do not invent finality
Retrieval date	When and where the source was captured	Do not substitute it for the source period
Question not answered	Ownership, decimal, appraisal correctness, private value, or another explicit limit	Stop before using the record outside its lane

For the broader transaction control record, use Understanding Texas Mineral Rights Transactions Today. For general valuation-input and as-of error analysis, use Understanding the Mineral Rights Assessment Errors. Those pages own broader jobs that Article 297 deliberately avoids.

What these dates do not establish

No single date in this crosswalk proves:

• legal ownership or authority to act;
• the property, lease, well, account, or decimal tied to a person;
• that a public record is complete or error-free;
• that an appraisal is correct or incorrect;
• a tax amount, protest deadline, or protest result;
• a private mineral-interest value or fair offer;
• whether a buyer is qualified or an agreement is suitable; or
• a future production or transaction outcome.

Those questions require their own records, current identifiers, applicable authority, and qualified review. A date label improves provenance; it does not expand what the source proves.

Controlled source record

Five official source objects were retrieved on August 31, 2026 and retained as 485,324 controlled bytes.

Source object	Bytes	SHA-256 prefix	Role
Comptroller Valuing Property	134,841	f8a36293f7b7	January 1 appraisal-date context
Comptroller Property Tax Data Reports	131,568	1213cab5f9ae	Submitted-data and report-year scope
RRC Production Data	45,614	25d52ca25b24	Operator-reported production context
RRC PDQ FAQ	58,425	9efdfe4160a1	Lag, snapshot, and revision boundary
RRC Data Sets Available for Download	114,876	ba615bbe5eeb	Dataset-specific update schedules

Claim ledger and stop conditions

Claim ID	Supported statement	Allowed evidence label	Stop condition
C297-01	Taxable property is generally appraised as of January 1	APPRAISAL-DATE-CONTEXT	Do not infer a private price or account result
C297-02	Comptroller reports use appraisal-district-submitted data and stated report scopes	REPORT-SCOPE	Do not treat one report year as universal currency
C297-03	RRC production information comes from operator reports	REPORTED-PRODUCTION	Do not infer ownership or royalty entitlement
C297-04	PDQ data has reporting lag and snapshot limits	PROCESSING-STATUS	Do not claim finality or no later corrections
C297-05	RRC download products have dataset-specific update schedules	DATASET-UPDATE-CADENCE	Do not generalize one schedule to every source
C297-06	Retrieval date records when a source was obtained	RESEARCH-PROVENANCE	Do not call it the source period without issuer support

Research scope and review boundaries

Before using a dated record for an owner-specific decision, verify the owner, authority, legal description, source identifier, interest type, decimal, applicable period, version, and purpose from the responsible records. If the question concerns title, appraisal, tax, protest, accounting, valuation, or a transaction, use the responsible official office and qualified advisers.

Sources reviewed for this article

• Texas Comptroller: Valuing Property
• Texas Comptroller: Property Tax Data Reports and Surveys
• Texas RRC: Oil and Gas Production Data
• Texas RRC: Production Data Query System FAQs
• Texas RRC: Data Sets Available for Download

Related mineral-rights research guides

• Texas Mineral Rights Guide
• Texas RRC Production by Lease: Retrieval-Provenance Worksheet
• Why Doesn’t My Texas Mineral Tax Value Match a Sale Estimate?
• Understanding the Mineral Rights Assessment Errors

Educational information only. This article explains source-date labels and evidence boundaries. It is not legal, tax, appraisal, accounting, engineering, investment, or financial advice; it is not a title opinion, property valuation, offer, or transaction recommendation. Verify owner-specific facts with the responsible office and qualified advisers. MRX provides educational information and resources only and does not buy mineral rights.

Frequently asked questions

Which three date roles belong in a Texas mineral record index?

Use separate fields for tax year or January 1 appraisal date, RRC production month and processed-data status, and download or retrieval date. Add the source identifier and limitation beside them.

Can a download date replace the production month?

No. The production month identifies the period reported. The download date records when someone obtained the source and does not redefine the reported month.

Why can RRC production data change after it is downloaded?

The Texas RRC says production information is a snapshot and may change as revised, corrected, or delinquent operator reports are received and processed.

Does January 1 identify the private sale value of a mineral interest?

No. The Comptroller uses January 1 in the property-tax appraisal context. This article does not convert an ad valorem record into a private mineral-interest price or offer conclusion.

What should a family do when one of the dates is missing?

Write not shown, retain the source and retrieval date, and ask the responsible issuer or qualified reviewer before using the record for an owner-specific conclusion.

Sources reviewed for this article

• Texas Comptroller Valuing Property (accessed 2026-08-31)
• Texas Comptroller Property Tax Data Reports and Surveys (accessed 2026-08-31)
• Texas RRC Oil and Gas Production Data (accessed 2026-08-31)
• Texas RRC Production Data Query System FAQs (accessed 2026-08-31)
• Texas RRC Data Sets Available for Download (accessed 2026-08-31)