Utah exhibits [of the] State of Arizona, complainant, v. State of California, Palo Verde Irrigation District, Imperial Irrigation District, Coachella Valley County Water District, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, City of Los Angeles, City of San Diego, and County of San Diego, defendants, United States of America and State of Nevada, interveners, State of New Mexico and State of Utah, parties

page 259

AGRICULTUBE UNDEB IRBIGATTON IHT BA8DT OF VIRGIN BIVEB. 259 WAT1B, TRANSFERS. With comparatively few exceptions, transfers of water in the basin of Virgin River are not recorded. Often they are accomplished by mere verbal agreements. In the incorporated companies they are entered on the books of the company at the verbal or written request of the grantor. The principal incorporated companies have not issued certificates of stock, and hence the grantee has no other evidence of title than a debit account against him on the books of the secretary for the assessments on the transferred stock. In many instances others than the original entrymen on land and the original appropriators of water are, and have been for twenty years, farming land with deed to neither land nor water; in other instances the only record of transfer is in the time book of the water master. The few exceptions to these conditions refer chiefly to the water of Quail Creek, although there are several recorded transfers to Virgin River water. More regard has been given transfers on Quail Creek because of the use made of its water for mining purposes. The deeds to water are based on the original agreement and arbitration by which the water was divided among the people of Leeds, Harrisburg, and Silver Reef. When incorporated water companies have been formed to control water formerly controlled by individuals, it is the practice for a joint deed to be executed to the company by the individual irrigators. This is not done in every case, and even when such a deed is executed it is not always recorded. These deeds lack definiteness, because in practically no case has the grantor a definite title to convey. A deed to one of the incorporated companies of Long Valley conveys "the right, title, and interest to as many acres of water right in the East Fork of Virgin River as will correspond to the number of shares set opposite" the names of the subscribers to stock in the company, but nowhere in the deed is reference made to the amount of water one acre of water right represents. The articles of agreement of the Orderville Irrigation Company contain no reference to transfers other than the number of shares of water right subscribed by each of the stockholders in the company. The deed conveying individual water rights to the Kanarraville Field Reservoir and Irrigation Company provides that the "owners and possessors of certain water rights in what is known as Kanarra Creek * * * convey and warrant to said company '* all their "respective righto to the use of the waters of the said Kanarra Creek, with the number of hours or shares and the value thereof" set opposite the names of the subscribers. Although not all entered in one book, the water transfers that are recorded in Washington County, Utah, are accessible through an abstract of real-estate transfers, water filings, adjudications of county water commissioner*, water transfers, etc. This abstract shows all essential facts of record. The water transfers are segregated by streams or springs and are in chronological order. If a deed convey* both land and water, reference to the water only is made under the stream or .spring to which it applies, the reference to the land being entered elsewhere. The laws of Utah relating to the conveyance of water rights" contain the following provision: A right to the use of water appurtenant to land shall pass to the grantee of such land, and in ca*<e8 where such right has been exercised in irrigating different parcels of land at different times such right " Revised Statutes of Utah, 1898, par. 12H1.