Written by Acorn Sales Company, manufacturing stamps and seals since 1964 · Reviewed by Holly R, VP of Sales and Marketing at Acorn Sales, against Arkansas State Board of Registration for Foresters on 22 September 2026 · Updated 22 September 2026
Arkansas is the state where reading only the first sentence gives you the wrong answer. Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306(a)(1) says each registrant “may obtain a seal of a design authorized by the Arkansas Forestry Commission, bearing the registrant’s name, serial number, and the legend ‘Registered Forester, Arkansas’”. The very next subsection, 17-31-306(a)(2), says all registrants engaged in the practice of forestry, whether in private practice or as an employee of a government agency, corporation, company, partnership, individual or other private employer, “shall endorse with his or her name and impress with his or her seal all plans, specifications, maps, reports, or documents which he or she prepares or which shall be prepared under his or her supervision”.
Both sentences are the law and both belong on this page. Obtaining the seal is phrased permissively. Impressing it on the listed documents is phrased as a duty on every practicing registrant, with no exemption for in house or government foresters. A registrant who reads “may obtain” and buys nothing is a registrant who cannot perform the duty in (a)(2) the next time a plan goes out. Arkansas should not be described as a state where the seal is optional, and we are saying that as plainly as we can.
Arkansas forester seal requirements at a glance
| Requirement | Arkansas rule | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Seal required | In effect yes. Obtaining the seal reads “may” in (a)(1), but impressing it reads “shall” in (a)(2) for all registrants engaged in the practice of forestry, in private practice or as an employee. Read together, a practicing registrant needs one. | Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306 |
| Required elements | Three, verbatim: the registrant’s name, serial number, and the legend “Registered Forester, Arkansas”. Note the comma form of the legend. It is not “Arkansas Registered Forester”. The design is “a design authorized by the Arkansas Forestry Commission”. | Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306(a)(1) |
| Size and shape | Not addressed. No diameter, no dimension and no shape appears in 17-31-306 or in the Board’s rules at 17 CAR Pt. 20, which we read. The verb “impress” implies an impression but states no size. Do not accept an inferred dimension from any supplier. | Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306; 17 CAR Pt. 20 |
| Device allowed | Not prescribed, with one textual signal. The operative verb is “impress with his or her seal”, which on its face contemplates an impression device. No rule expressly requires an embosser, expressly permits an ink stamp or expressly excludes anything. | Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306(a)(2) |
| Signature and date | Both name and seal are required and they are not alternatives: the statute reads “shall endorse with his or her name and impress with his or her seal”. A sealed document without the name endorsement does not answer the sentence. No dating requirement is published. | Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306(a)(2) |
| What must be sealed | Verbatim: “all plans, specifications, maps, reports, or documents which he or she prepares or which shall be prepared under his or her supervision”. The word documents at the end makes this the broadest list of the eight states in this batch. | Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306(a)(2) |
| Electronic seal | Not addressed. No electronic or digital seal provision appears in Ark. Code Ann. ch. 17-31 or in the Board’s rules, and no third party digital certificate is required. Nothing authorizes an electronic seal and nothing forbids one. | Ark. Code Ann. ch. 17-31; 17 CAR Pt. 20 |
| Renewal and lapse | 17-31-307 governs expiration and renewal. Post lapse sealing is criminal: anyone who endorses his or her name or impresses his or her seal on a document after the certificate has expired or been revoked “shall be charged with a misdemeanor unless his or her certificate has been renewed or reissued”. 17-31-310 covers reissuance. | Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306(b), 17-31-307, 17-31-310 |
| Firm requirements | No firm registration or firm seal provision was located in ch. 17-31. The seal duty expressly reaches registrants employed by a government agency, corporation, company, partnership, individual or other private employer, so an in house forester seals on the same terms as a consultant. | Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306(a)(2) |
| Regulator | Arkansas State Board of Registration for Foresters, administratively attached to the Arkansas Department of Agriculture. The statute names the Arkansas Forestry Commission as the authority that authorizes the seal design; see the note below on the 2023 reorganization. | Ark. Code Ann. ch. 17-31; Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306(a)(1) |
May or shall? Both, and here is how they fit together
Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306 is headed “Seal - Unlawful use” and it has two subsections that a careless reader will take as contradicting each other. They do not contradict. They govern two different acts.
Subsection (a)(1) governs obtaining: “Each registrant may obtain a seal of a design authorized by the Arkansas Forestry Commission, bearing the registrant’s name, serial number, and the legend ‘Registered Forester, Arkansas’.” Subsection (a)(2) governs using: all registrants engaged in the practice of forestry “shall endorse with his or her name and impress with his or her seal all plans, specifications, maps, reports, or documents which he or she prepares or which shall be prepared under his or her supervision”.
So the permission is about acquisition and the command is about application. A registrant who never practices forestry, and therefore never prepares or supervises a plan, map, specification, report or document, is never reached by (a)(2) and has no need of a seal. Every registrant who does practice is reached by (a)(2) every time a covered document leaves their hands, and (a)(2) cannot be performed without the thing (a)(1) permits you to obtain. That is why we will not write Arkansas up as a seal optional state.
The three things that go on the die
The element list is short and the statute spells it out rather than delegating it: the registrant’s name, the registrant’s serial number, and the legend “Registered Forester, Arkansas”.
Two details are worth getting right before anyone cuts metal or rubber. First, the number is called a serial number in Arkansas, which is the number on your certificate of registration under 17-31-305. It is the same number a neighboring state would call a license number, but if you are filling in an order form that asks for a license number, that is what goes there. Second, the legend is given in comma form. The statute writes “Registered Forester, Arkansas”, with the state after the credential and a comma between them. It does not write “Arkansas Registered Forester”, and a die that says the latter is not carrying the legend the statute names. Send the legend to your maker exactly as the statute writes it.
The document list is the broadest in this batch
Compare Arkansas against its neighbors and the breadth stands out. Alabama and Georgia reach plans, maps, specifications and reports. Maine reaches plans, maps and reports. Maryland reaches any plan, map, specification or report. Arkansas reaches “all plans, specifications, maps, reports, or documents”, and that final catch all term does real work.
It also reaches two categories of authorship rather than one: documents the registrant prepares, and documents “prepared under his or her supervision”. If a technician on your crew drafts a stand map under your direction and it goes out, it is within (a)(2). The flip side is the limit: (a)(2) reaches only what you prepared or supervised, so work that is neither is outside the mandate. We did not locate an express prohibition on sealing another person’s work in the statute, but nothing in (a)(2) authorizes it either.
In house and government foresters seal too
The statute forecloses the argument that the seal duty is only for consultants. Subsection (a)(2) applies to registrants practicing “either in a private professional practice or as an employee of an agency of the government or of a corporation, company, partnership, individual, or other private employer”. That phrasing is doing deliberate work: it names government employment first and then walks through every ordinary form of private employment.
If you are a staff forester for a timber company, a paper mill, a land trust or a state agency, and you prepare or supervise plans, maps, specifications, reports or documents, the same sentence applies to you as to a sole practitioner. The seal carries your own name and your own serial number, not your employer’s, because registration in Arkansas is personal.
What “impress” suggests about the device
Here is the one place where Arkansas hints at a device without prescribing one. The verb in (a)(2) is “impress with his or her seal”. An impression is what an embosser makes. No rule anywhere in chapter 17-31 or in the Board’s rules requires an embosser, permits a rubber stamp in terms, or excludes any device, and there is no reproduction or legibility test of the kind some engineering boards publish.
What follows for a buyer is a practical rather than a legal judgment, and we will label it as ours. The word “impress” is the only textual signal, and an embosser answers it literally. Against that, an embossed impression is raised and uninked, so it often disappears in a scan, a photocopy or a flat PDF export, which is how most forestry documents now travel. Many registrants in states with this kind of wording keep both: an embosser for the signed original held in the file, and an ink stamp of the same artwork for the copies that circulate. Ask the Board if you want a ruling rather than a judgment, because the statute does not supply one.
No size is published, and we will not invent one
There is no diameter in 17-31-306. There is no diameter in the Board’s rules at 17 CAR Pt. 20, which cover board governance, registration, fees, continuing education and discipline and contain no seal provision at all. We looked for a published drawing of the “authorized design” on the Department of Agriculture site and did not find one.
That absence matters commercially, because the honest thing a manufacturer can say about an Arkansas forester seal is that the three elements are fixed by statute and the dimensions are not fixed by anything we could find. Anyone quoting you a required Arkansas diameter is quoting you a house convention, and should say so. The safe approach is to size the die so that the legend and the serial number stay readable at the size you will actually use, and to ask the Board first if you want their authorized design on file before you commit.
Sealing after your registration lapses is a misdemeanor
Subsection (b) of the same section is the enforcement half, and Arkansas writes it as a criminal provision: “Anyone who endorses his or her name or impresses his or her seal upon any document, after the certificate of registration of the registrant named thereon has expired or has been revoked, shall be charged with a misdemeanor unless his or her certificate has been renewed or reissued.”
Read the subject of that sentence carefully. It says “anyone”. It reaches the registrant and it reaches a colleague or assistant who applies a lapsed registrant’s seal to a document. It also covers the name endorsement separately from the seal impression, so signing without sealing does not sidestep it. Expiration and renewal are governed by 17-31-307 and reissuance by 17-31-310; we were not able to read those two sections verbatim, so confirm your own renewal date with the Board rather than from this page.
A sourcing caveat you should know about before you engrave
We would rather tell you this than have you find it out later. Arkansas does not put its official code text on a free public site. The official Arkansas Code is published by LexisNexis behind a paywall, the General Assembly site does not serve code section text, and the legislature’s PDFs came back truncated through our connection. The verbatim words of 17-31-306 quoted on this page were therefore read on a republisher.
The substance is not in doubt: the section heading, the structure of subchapter 3 and the three seal elements were confirmed from more than one place, and the Board’s own published material is consistent with them. But before Acorn or anyone else engraves the legend onto a die for the first time, the exact wording of 17-31-306 is worth confirming against the official Arkansas Code. That is a five minute check for a die you will use for years.
The 2023 reorganization and the agency named in the statute
A second open item, and it affects one word rather than the whole rule. The history note on 17-31-306 records an amendment by Acts 2023, No. 691, which was the Forestry Commission and Department of Agriculture reorganization act. The text we read still says the design is “authorized by the Arkansas Forestry Commission”. We could not confirm whether the current official text still names the Forestry Commission or now names the Department of Agriculture or the Secretary of Agriculture, because the enrolled act came back truncated.
This does not touch the three seal elements. The name, the serial number and the legend “Registered Forester, Arkansas” are unaffected by which agency authorizes the design, and none of them names the agency. It matters only if you were planning to put the authorizing agency’s name on the die itself, which the statute does not ask you to do. If you want the authorized design on file before ordering, write to the Board through the Arkansas Department of Agriculture, which is where the Board is now administratively attached.
Ordering an Arkansas forester seal
Send us three things and they are the three the statute names: your name as it appears on your certificate of registration, your serial number, and the legend exactly as the statute writes it, “Registered Forester, Arkansas”. If you have obtained the authorized design from the Board, send that too and we will match it rather than lay out our own.
On devices, the statute’s word is “impress”. From the forester range the Forester Handheld Seal Embosser at $46.95 and the Forester Desk Seal Embosser at $44.95 are the two ordinary embossers, and the Forester Long Reach Desk Seal Embosser at $129.95 reaches further into a bound or folded document. For the copies that actually circulate, the Forester Self Inking Rubber Stamp of Seal at $39.95 and the Forester MaxLight Pre Inked Rubber Stamp of Seal at $46.95 reproduce cleanly in a scan, which an embossed impression often does not. The Forester eSeal Electronic Image Stamp of Seal at $20.00 gives you the same artwork as an image file for documents you assemble yourself. Browse the forester stamps and seals collection, or contact us with your artwork and we will proof it before cutting.
Keeping it right year to year
The seal carries your name and your serial number, so the two events that make a correct die wrong are a name change and, in theory, a change of serial number on reissuance. Nothing in the statute or the rules says what to do about a seal in either case, so the answer comes from the element list rather than from a rule: if the die no longer says what 17-31-306(a)(1) says it should say, it is no longer the seal the statute describes.
The other annual item is your own registration status, and here the stakes are set by subsection (b) rather than by good practice. Sealing on an expired or revoked certificate is a misdemeanor. Keep a renewed certificate and keep the die where only you can reach it, because the criminal provision reaches anyone who applies a lapsed registrant’s seal, not only the registrant. This page is a research summary and not legal advice.
- Forester Stamps and Seals: State Rules, Sizes and Prices
- Maryland Forester Seal: Required, Design by Board
- Alabama Forester: No Seal, Endorsement Required
- Forester stamps and seals
Frequently asked questions
Is a seal optional for an Arkansas registered forester?
Not in practice. Ark. Code Ann. 17-31-306(a)(1) says a registrant “may obtain” a seal, but 17-31-306(a)(2) says every registrant engaged in the practice of forestry “shall endorse with his or her name and impress with his or her seal” all plans, specifications, maps, reports or documents they prepare or supervise. The permission is about getting one; the command is about using one.
What has to appear on an Arkansas forester seal?
Three elements, named in the statute: the registrant’s name, the serial number, and the legend “Registered Forester, Arkansas”. The legend is in comma form and should be reproduced exactly that way rather than as “Arkansas Registered Forester”.
How big does an Arkansas forester seal have to be?
No size is published. 17-31-306 states no diameter and no shape, and the Board’s rules at 17 CAR Pt. 20 contain no seal provision at all. We did not find a published drawing of the authorized design either. Size the die for legibility and ask the Board if you want their authorized design on file first.
Do I need an embosser, or will an ink stamp do?
No device is prescribed. The only signal in the text is the verb “impress”, which an embosser answers literally. Against that, an embossed impression often disappears in a scan or a flat PDF, so many registrants keep an embosser for the original and an ink stamp of the same artwork for the copies that circulate.
I work in house for a timber company. Does the seal duty apply to me?
Yes. 17-31-306(a)(2) expressly reaches registrants practicing as an employee of a government agency or of a corporation, company, partnership, individual or other private employer, on the same terms as a registrant in private practice. The seal carries your own name and serial number.
What happens if I seal something after my registration expires?
17-31-306(b) makes it a misdemeanor. Anyone who endorses a name or impresses a seal on a document after the registrant’s certificate has expired or been revoked is charged with a misdemeanor unless the certificate has been renewed or reissued. The provision says “anyone”, so it reaches staff as well as the registrant.
Does Arkansas accept an electronic seal?
Nothing is addressed. There is no electronic or digital seal provision in chapter 17-31 or in the Board’s rules, and no third party digital certificate requirement. Nothing authorizes an electronic seal and nothing forbids one, so confirm with the Board before relying on an imaged seal for a document that matters.
Who authorizes the seal design, the Forestry Commission or the Department of Agriculture?
The text we read says “a design authorized by the Arkansas Forestry Commission”. A 2023 reorganization act amended this section and we could not confirm whether the current official text still names the Forestry Commission. The three seal elements are unaffected. The Board is now administratively attached to the Arkansas Department of Agriculture, which is where to write for the authorized design.
