Bree v. Wheeler
Before: Cooper
Synopsis
Water Rights—Adverse User—Interruption.—An adverse user of the waters of a stream, in order to ripen into a title, must have been continuous and uninterrupted; and any interruption of the adverse user, however slight, prevents the acquisition of a prescriptive title.
Id.—Insufficient Finding—Adverse User of Half of Stream.—A finding of an adverse user of one-half of the stream in controversy, which shows that the user had been interrupted by the plaintiff at least once each year, by acts found to be acts of trespass, and which does not show that the defendant’s user was open or notorious, Is Insufficient to support a judgment awarding one-half of the water to the defendant.
Id.—Agreement for Division of Stream not Pleaded—New Trial— Amendment of Answer.—Where the defendant testified to an agreement between plaintiff and defendant for division of the stream, which was not pleaded nor found, he will be allowed leave to amend the answer upon a new trial granted upon appeal.
Id.—Complaint—Defective Allegations—Appropriation —Adverse User—Amendment.—A complaint not specifically alleging that the plaintiff is the owner of the stream in controversy, and which attempts to allege an appropriation by plaintiff’s grantor, without pleading the acts of such appropriation, and which alleges an adverse user by the plaintiff interrupted by the defendant, will be allowed to be amended upon a new trial granted upon plaintiff's appeal.
COOPER, C.
Suit to determine the right to the water running in a stream known as “Battlesnake creek.” Judgment awarding one-half the water to plaintiff and one-half to defendant. Plaintiff made a motion for a new trial, which was denied, and he appeals from the judgment and order denying his motion. Defendant in his answer claimed and set forth that he had been in the adverse possession and use of all the waters of said stream for more than five years prior to the commencement of the action. The court found: “That the defendant has constantly, under a claim of right adverse to the plaintiff, used one-half of the waters of said stream at the point of his diversion, under an adverse claim of right against the plaintiff, ever since the year 1887.....That the use of said water by the defendant has been every year, at least, once interrupted, by turning it out of the head of defendant’s ditch by the plaintiff, hut the court finds such acts by the plaintiff to have been mere trespasses.”
[147]
Upon thisfinding alone the court,as a conclusion of law,found, -defendant to be the owner of one-half the water of the creek. The finding does not show all the facts essential to establish title in defendant by adverse user. The user, in order to ripen into a title, must have been continuous and uninterrupted. (Washburn on Easements and Servitudes, 4th ed., 172; Angell on Watercourses, sec. 214;
Alta Land etc. Co. v. Hancock,
85 Cal. 226.
1
)
Interruption of adverse user, however slight, prevents acquisition of title by prescription.
(American Co. v. Bradford,
27 Cal. 368;
Cave v. Crafts,
53 Cal. 138;
Ball v. Kehl,
95 Cal. 613.)
The possession must have been open and notorious, and not clandestine.
(Alta Land etc. Co. v. Hancock, supra; Unger v. Mooney,
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