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Show SPRING WATERS 601 We also refuse to approve the broad statement that there cannot be a private ownership in springs of water. The case is not parallel to the question of the ownership of the water of a stream. A spring may have no natural outlet, in which case the owner of the land in which it lies, under ordinary circumstances, owns the water as completely as he does the soil. A year later, a district court of appeal quoted with approval a statement that where the natural flow of a spring does not pass beyond the boundaries of the land on which the spring is located, the owner may use all of its water.182 With respect to the waters of a spring rising on private land, the natural flow from which does not pass on the surface beyond the boundaries of the land, the rights of the landowner in California as against the usual adverse parties in such cases may be stated as follows: (1) As against a stranger who undertakes to appropriate the flow at the spring, the landowner may use all the water of the spring. (2) As against appropriators or riparian owners on a stream who claim that the flow from the spring passes naturally into the stream by subterranean means, the landowner may use all the water from the spring if the evidence fails to show such underground connection; but if the interconnection is proved, his rights must be coordinated with theirs. (3) As against holders of rights in the ground waters that supply the spring, the rights of the landowner are correlative with theirs, but he may use all the water that reaches and flows from the spring. Spring on public land. -Rights to the use of springs located on the public domain of the United States may be acquired by appropriation under the laws of the State pursuant to authority granted by Congress in the Act of 1866 and in subsequent legislation.183 No prescriptive title to the use of a spring on the public domain can be asserted while the land remains in public ownership, "for the reason that there can be no prescription as against the Government."184 Hence, one who wishes to acquire a right to use water on the public domain can do so "only by an 'appropriation' made in the manner provided by law, that is, by reducing the water to actual possession for a beneficial use." The Federal Government, as proprietor of the public domain, early recognized the necessity of permitting acquisition of such rights distinct from the lands themselves and provided authority therefor as stated above.18S That appropriations of water on the public domain must conform to State laws is specifically provided by Congressional legislation recognizing and lS2San Francisco Bank v. Longer, 43 Cal. App. (2d) 263, 268, 110 Pac. (2d) 687 (1941). The quoted statement was from 25 "California Jurisprudence" 1106, § 113. 18314 Stat. 253, § 9 (1866); 16 Stat. 218 (1870); 19 Stat. 377 (1877), 43 U.S.C. § 321 et seq. (1964). 184 Wilkins v. McCue, 46 Cal. 656, 661 (1873). 18SSimons v. Inyo Cerro Gordo Min. & Power Co., 48 Cal. App. 524, 535, 536,192 Pac. 144 (1920). |