Do you own the water on your property? Well, that depends.



Lakes: If you own all the land surrounding the lake, then the water should belong to you. If you only own some of the land surrounding it, then you have what are called usufructuary rights, meaning that you can drink it, swim in it, fish in it, etc. (unless there is a law expressly prohibiting this). You own water as soon as you take it out of the lake.

Streams: If the stream or river begins and ends on your property, then it belongs to you. If it runs through other property, then you have usufructuary rights as described above, and you own it as soon as you take it out of the stream or river. You generally can't do anything to a stream that your property borders that would interferer with the rights of owners of property that birders the stream but is downstream from you. An exception to this rule is that you can use such stream water for domestic uses even if it interferes with the use by downstream property owners – if you take your yearly bath in the stream and it stinks up the stream for downstream users, there's not much they can do about it.

Navigable or Tidal Bodies of Water (the Great Lakes, the Mississippi River, or the Pacific Ocean, for example): Public and federal rights apply to these larger bodies of water, and the type of rights you enjoy are more limited – the federal government can prevent you from doing anything that may interfere with these public and federal rights. The federal government has special rights over all navigable waterways in the United States, which is why you can't dam up the Mississippi River even if you own land on both sides of it.

An important point to note is that water laws include both federal and state laws, and state laws differ, especially between the esadtern and western states.