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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Allen" data-source="post: 491113" data-attributes="member: 389">Lots of people like to blame tile for flooding, etc.  While I agree that in some settings, tile drainage can greatly alter surface waters, that's probably not why Horsehead, Alkaline, WoodHouse, etc are now viable walleye fisheries.  The bottom line is that east of Highway 83, there is simply increased water runoff from a generally wetter climate than that of 100 years ago.There's a pretty good paper out on this topic:  <a href="https://pubs.usgs.gov/sir/2023/5064/h/sir20235064h.pdf" target="_blank">https://pubs.usgs.gov/sir/2023/5064/h/sir20235064h.pdf</a>It's a pretty long and tedious read if you're not as into this topic as I am, but this series of graphics kind of summarizes the trends over the past 100, 75, 50, and 30 years.[ATTACH=full]85076[/ATTACH]I could run on and on with this topic, but one of the key drivers IMHO, have been wetter than normal falls and early spring when the ground is thawed but we don't have active vegetative growth.  This timing aspect increases the amount of water that can collect in surface waters through much lower evapotranspiration, and make it into the creeks and those surficial aquifers that are often well connected to these Prairie Potholes. Some of this can be picked out in this graphic from the same paper:[ATTACH=full]85077[/ATTACH]Note all the occurrences of blue on the left side of the above graphic.  Clearly shows we are seeing higher flows in the fall over the past 30-some years for the Red River at Pembina.  This is taking place all across the PPR. As far as the original post?  It seems to me that he may not have done his due diligence on the easements before he bought the land.  I, in no way, shape, or form support the government trying to change the originally agreed upon easement, and I hope the courts would prevent that under the 5th Amendment.  However, I often hear people complain about these wildlife easements.  If you can't live with the easements, you probably overpaid for the land.  I know some easements originally paid up to 50% of the value of the land.  In those circumstances, I would think it should still be valued at roughly half the worth of a similar parcel of land with no easement. Bottom line, In the eastern part of the U.S. it was very profitable for many years to buy swamp land, drain it, and resell it as productive farmland or development at a much higher valuation than one originally paid for it.  Then in the early 1900s came the collapse of the waterfowl population in the eastern flyway.  Congress took action in the form of the US Fish and Wildlife Service, Corps of Engineers, and USDA programs to support the waterfowl population by making it difficult to reduce the number of acres of productive wetlands.  Hence all the WPAs, Refuges, etc across ND.  Nonetheless, people still buy wetlands with the intent to "develop" the land and then they get all sorts of bent out of shape when they run into the Swampbuster rules. Lycan, that drained wetland you pointed out may be an illegal drain (I literally don't know the rules well enough to know for sure), the city doesn't care because they aren't required to enforce federal law.  Either the Corps of Engineers under dredge and fill regulations, or the USFWS under swampbuster would be the ones I'd expect to take enforcement action if deemed necessary.Separate topic (kind of), but anyone know the story behind that pile of fill placed into that wetland east of Bismarck on Highway 10? [ATTACH=full]85078[/ATTACH]Someone sure spent a lot of time and money hauling fill to the above site (rocks, concrete, dirt, etc) only to now have not done anything with it over the past decade.</blockquote>

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