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Show WASTE, SEEPAGE, AND RETURN WATERS 575 A statute enacted in 1941 provides:55 Artificial surface waters, as distinguished from natural surface waters, are hereby defined for the purpose of this act as waters whose appearance or accumulation is due to escape, seepage, loss, waste, drainage, or percolation from constructed works, either directly or indirectly, and which depend for their continuance upon the acts of man. Such artificial waters are primarily private and subject to beneficial use by the owner or developer thereof; Provided, that when such waters pass unused beyond the domain of the owner or developer and are deposited in a natural stream or watercourse and have not been applied to beneficial use by such owner or developer for a period of four [4] years from the first appearance thereof, they shall be subject to appropriation and use; Provided, that no appropriator can acquire a right, excepting by contract, grant, dedication, or condemnation, as against the owner or developer compelling him to continue such water supply. Oregon.-A statute originally enacted in 1893 provides that:56 All ditches now or hereafter constructed, for the purpose of utilizing waste, spring, or seepage waters, shall be governed by the same laws relating to priority of right as those ditches constructed for the purpose of utilizing the waters of running streams; provided, that the person upon whose lands the seepage or spring waters first arise, shall have the right to the use of such waters. Two other extant statutory provisions are in point: (1) No application for a permit to appropriate waste or seepage water to be conveyed through a conduit not owned wholly by the applicant shall be approved without the filing of an agreement between the applicant and the conduit owner. (2) The holder of a right to the use of waste or seepage water may, under certain circumstances, be required to pay the total cost of installing measuring devices in the ditch and the expenses of measuring and distributing the water.57 Waters released from control works when not necessary for use of the appropriator, after having been diverted or impounded in good faith, are waste waters,58 as are waters released from lands after having been used to irrigate them.59 The excess water used in irrigation, however, is not waste so long as it S5N. Mex. Laws 1941, ch. 126, § 21, Stat. Ann. § 75-5-25 (1968). This enactment replaces a section of the original 1907 water appropriation statute giving the owner of constructed works the first right to the use of seepage waters therefrom upon filing an application with the State Engineer within 1 year after completion of the works or appearance of the seepage, any party thereafter being allowed to appropriate the seepage water upon application to the State Engineer and upon paying the owner of the works reasonable compensation for storing or carrying the water. "Oreg. Laws. 1893, § 1, p. 150, Rev. Stat. § 537.800 (Supp. 1969). "Oreg. Rev. Stat. § § 537.160(2) and 540.230 (Supp. 1969). " Vaughn v. Kolb, 130 Oreg. 506, 511, 513, 280 Pac. 518 (1929). MOliver v. Skinner & Lodge, 190 Oreg. 423, 441, 226 Pac. (2d) 507 (1951). |