How to tell if I own a watercourse?
You will usually own a stretch of watercourse that:
- That runs through your land at the surface.
- Is culverted (piped) under your land.
- Forms the boundary of your land (up to the centre of the channel or pipe).
It is important to remember that fences, walls or hedges are often not on boundaries. It is very common for garden fences to separate homes from watercourses but that does not necessarily mean you don’t own that stretch of watercourse.
For example, the photo below shows a wire mesh fence inside the watercourse’s channel. This does not define the landowner’s ownership boundary.
