The natural resources of the land are considered to belong to the tribe as a whole and not to those who possessed the particular parcel. The Iroquois leased the right to extract stone from the lands in one instance and fixed royalties on all the production. After natural gas had been discovered on the reservation, the Six Nations took direct ownership of the natural gas wells. They paid persons who had wells on their land compensation only for damages done by gas extraction. This setup closely resembled the precontact land distribution system where the tribes owned the land and distributed it for use, but not unconditional ownership.