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Show THE RIPARIAN RIGHT 107 the riparian right by the highest courts in most Western jurisdictions in which the riparian doctrine has been recognized.547 What domestic use includes.- Domestic uses include drinking, cooking, washing, and laundering-the uses of water necessary for the sustenance of human beings and for their household conveniences. The term is sometimes used to include the watering of farm animals.548 In 1944, the California Supreme Court defined the term domestic purpose as including "consumption for the sustenance of human beings, for household conveniences, and for the care of livestock."549 However, as noted later under "Stockwatering," the number of farm animals watered usually enters into the determination of natural use of water, in common with drinking and household use for human beings, only to the extent of the number of animals ordinarily kept to sustain the domestic needs of man-beyond this limit, stockwatering usually is not a natural use. In addition to the foregoing, the term has come to be used to include the watering of garden and other produce reasonably necessary for the riparian owner's domestic consumption.550 The inclusion of this minor irrigation of homestead and farmstead lands as a part of family domestic use appears in some current statutes and administrative rules and regulations. Following are legislative definitions in Oklahoma and South Dakota, respectively: "Domestic Use" means the use of water by a natural individual or by a family or household for household purposes, for farm and domestic animals up to the normal grazing capacity of the land, and for the irrigation of land not exceeding a total of three (3) acres in area for the growing of gardens, orchards and lawns, and water for such purposes may be stored in an amount not to exceed two years supply .SS1 M7See the citations under "Natural and Artificial Uses of Water," supra. In addition, see Oklahoma City v. Tytenicz, 171 Okla. 519, 521, 43 Pac. (2d) 747 (1935); Smith v. Stanolind Oil & Gas Co., 197 Okla. 499, 500, 172 Pac. (2d) 1002 (1946). 548Shook v. Colohan, 12 Oreg. 239, 244, 6 Pac. 503 (1885), drinking, use for culinary purposes, and watering animals. 5A9Pratherv. Hoberg, 24 Cal. (2d) 549, 562,150 Pac. (2d) 405 (1944). 550Hough v. Porter, 51 Oreg. 318,403-404, 95 Pac. 732 (1908), 98 Pac. 1083 (1909), 102 Pac. 728 (1909). The court stated that the necessary use of an adequate supply of w^ater for domestic purposes and for the watering of animals needed for the proper subsistence and maintenance of the riparian proprietor and his family no doubt gave rise to the doctrine of riparian rights in the earliest development of the law thereon. This was followed by requirements for navigation, next extended to the use of the water for power purposes, "and later to the production of such garden and grains as was essential to the subsistence of the family of such riparian owner." As civilization spread over the semiarid and arid regions, the riparian right was extended to include irrigation on a large scale as well as other industrial uses. See also Caviness v. La Grande In. Co., 60 Oreg. 410,420,119 Pac. 731 (1911). 551 Okla. Stat. Ann. tit. 82, § l-A(a) (1970). |
