He spent two surveying seasons in Iowa, during 1836–37 and 1842–43. There he ran the course of the fifth principal meridian in Iowa. Burt used his solar compass for the first time in 1836. Alvin, one of his sons, surveyed the boundary line between Iowa and Minnesota with this same instrument. He also surveyed Township and Range lines in Wisconsin from 1840 to 1842, where his five sons also worked. Wisconsin and Michigan disputed over boundary lines, so to settle the matter Burt was selected to make a re-survey of the interstate boundary. He was the first United States linear surveyor in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.