Sorry - this is incorrect. The fee property boundary (the land actually owned by the US Government (USACE in this case)) varies from lake to lake and/or wildlife management area. It was largely dependent on what the future plans for the reservoir might have been (like a pool raise), if additional land was needed to flood in the event of high water, when and where the reservoir was built, or, like Jim Chapman lake/Cooper dam, not enough land was available to satisfy a court challenge to the environmental impact statement in order to mitigate the loss of habitat and the White Oak Creek Mitigation Area was purchased in fee simple (excepting a portion that was already part of Lake Wright Patman). As far as land above the pool elevation, as said, it varies. For instance, Lake Wright Patman has a lot of land (some 45,000 acres) outside the pool elevation(s) (approximately 20,000 acres in size at the conservation or normal pool level), but Lake Lewisville has only some 28,000 acres (mostly in the upper end) above the normal pool (23,000 acre). Lewisville has some private property very close to the lake but still outside (above) the flood pool (there is a normal pool and a flood pool which is the height of the spillway with some additional land above that elevation (usually) as 'freeboard'. The property boundary on most fee owned lakes/reservoirs typically follows old property lines so that it kinda zig zags across the landscape. However - there were exceptions where the former land owner did not want to sell all the land (or USACE was trying to trim costs) and the USACE boundary follows a contour (elevation) across the land (Lake Sam Rayburn has a lot of this (Lake Sam was constructed mostly on US Forest Service lands so little land was bought from land owners)). Some land owners in East Texas for some of the earlier lakes constructed (1940s and 1950s) were happy to sell their unproductive bottom land and burnt out cotton fields so the government actually got more land than was needed. There are also some parcels on USACE reservoirs where the land owner was willing to sell the right to flood the land to the USACE and kept title simple to the land but is prohibited from building on it. Fee owned property boundaries are always marked, however, sometimes they are not so clear and on a lot of reservoirs just the trees were blazed. Corners are usually marked with a stake and the USACE property boundary language. Also marked (usually) is the high pool (flood) elevation - same deal, usually a tree blaze but mostly a stake with sign. True - the managing operations office for a specific lake might get troubled if an adjacent land owner starts cutting grass (or trees) on USACE fee lands or below the flood pool boundary. There are permits to allow some of this cutting by adjacent landowners - even taking down of some brush and trees. A person just needs to go to the lake managing office and ask.4copas wrote:COE property around lakes are usually measured by elevation above or below sea level. This elevation line would create the property line.
Probably a lot more info than you wanted...
Sometimes I feel like a "voice crying in the wilderness" )
