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Show WYOMING 821 all water rights to be initiated by the filing of an application with the State engineer. The court noted that, even if possession could ripen into prescriptive title, there would have to be actual, open, hostile, exclusive, and continuous use for the period prescribed by statute for acquiring ownership interests in land by adverse pos- session.117 D. ESTOPPEL The principles of laches and estoppel were held to be available defenses to a claim that a contract was invalid where the owner of a water right acquired a contractual right to construct a reservoir in consideration for furnishing storage water to irrigate land not described in the project permit. The parties had acquiesced in the contract for decades and in reliance upon this agreement had ex- pended large amounts of money, time, and labor.118 An action to declare a water right forfeited was barred by laches where approxi- mately a quarter of a century had elapsed since the time that the alleged nonuse had taken place.119 E. MISCELLANEOUS Questions often arise, and much confusion exists, with respect to the extent to which rights atach to, or are lost in, waste, return flow, and imported water. These questions really do not fall nicely within the category of "loss" of water rights, but they do deserve brief mention. (1) Waste and seepage water is private water as long as it is on the lands of the user who originates it.120 While a user cannot be compelled to maintain a wasteful practice, once waste and seepage water has escaped the original appropriator, it may be appropri- ated by someone else. This reappropriation is good against all but the original appropriator.121 (2) Waste and seepage waters which return to the stream, with no intent on the part of the owner to recapture them, are considered to be "return flow" to the stream, and become a part of the water- course, and are subject to reappropriation.122 Under the facts pre- sented in one case, it was held that a city's return flow from its sewage treatment works was not encompassed within the city's right and could not be recaptured by the city to the detriment of a down- stream appropriator, but the city was not bound so as to prevent it from making other arrangements to discharge sewage effluent (other- wise, the city might be unduly restricted in sewage disposal).123 (3) Imported waters, a class not mentioned in Wyoming cases, are those which are imported from one watershed to another. Wyo- ming does have a statute relating to what is defined as "foreign" water, and this is water from interstate streams, which is not avail- U7 Campbell v. Wyoming Development Co., 55 Wyo. 347, 100 P. 2d 124 (1940). ™> Anderson v. Wyoming Development Co., 60 Wyo. 417, 154 P. 2d 318 (1944). U8 florae Creek Conservation Dist. v. Lincoln Land Co., 54 Wyo. 320, 92 P. 2d 572 (1939). ™ Binning v. Miller, 55 Wyo. 451, 102 P. 2d 54 (1940). 121 Bower v. Big Horn Canal Association, 77 Wyo. 80, 307 P. 2d 593 (1957). ^Binning v. Miller, 55 Wyo. 451, 102 P. 2d 54 (1940) ; Bower v. Big Horn Canal Association, 77 Wyo. 80, 307 P. 2d 593 (1957). 123 Wyoming Hereford Ranch v. Hammond Packing Co., 33 Wyo. 14, 236 Pac. 764 <1925). |