Clark v. Di Prima

Appellants and respondent own contiguous farmland with 1,320 feet of common boundary. Respondent’s property slopes toward appellants’ at a gradient of 1 foot to 100 feet, but there is a ridge or dike along the common boundary approximately 6 feet wide, of varying height. Respondent irrigated his land by flooding, obtaining water from a Merced Irrigation District ditch. Appellants’ adjoining land was planted to almond trees, which were irrigated by a sprinkler system.

According tp the settled statement on appeal, when appellant David Clark discovered some of his almond trees flooded about 9 a.m. on June 4, 1961, he shut off the flow of water in respondent’s ditch at the headgate, some 400 feet away. A Merced Irrigation District ditehtender testified that when he arrived at the property about noon, the water was already shut off. He also testified that respondent’s ditch had broken or given way, that the ditch needed cleaning, that he had previously warned respondent to clean the ditch, that the district’s gate to respondent’s ditch was locked after the 1961 flooding, that respondent cleaned the ditch and the lock was removed.

Respondent testified that the first time he knew of…