Legal Definitions - meander line

A meander line is a specific type of survey line drawn by land surveyors to represent the general shape and course of a natural body of water, such as a river, stream, or lake, as it borders a parcel of land. It is crucial to understand that a meander line is not a legal boundary line. Instead, it serves to approximate the water's edge at the time of the survey, primarily for calculating the acreage of the land parcel and depicting its configuration. The actual legal boundary of a property bordering a navigable waterway often remains the dynamic edge of the water itself, which can naturally shift over time due to processes like erosion or accretion. For non-navigable waters, the boundary typically extends to the center of the water body, regardless of the meander line.

• Imagine a large ranch being sold that borders a winding, non-navigable river. During the land survey for the sale, the surveyor draws a meander line along the riverbank to illustrate the river's path and help calculate the total acreage of the ranch. However, the legal boundary of the ranch is not this fixed survey line, but rather the actual, shifting edge of the river itself. If the river naturally changes course slightly over time, the ranch's boundary will move with it, even though the meander line on the survey map remains in its original position.

• A developer plans to subdivide a large tract of land into several residential lots along the shore of a large, navigable lake. A surveyor establishes a meander line to show the general contour of the lake's shoreline on the plat map, which is used for planning the layout of the lots and calculating their approximate sizes. While the meander line provides a visual representation and aids in acreage calculations, the actual legal boundary for each lakefront lot extends to the ordinary high-water mark of the lake, meaning the property line is the dynamic edge of the water, not the static meander line drawn on the map.

• Consider a historical land grant from the government for a property adjacent to a small, non-navigable creek. The original survey from the 1800s included a meander line that traced the creek's path. This line was used to estimate the total land area being granted. Over a century later, the creek has slightly shifted its course due to natural processes. The current property owner's land still legally extends to the center of the creek, even though the creek's actual position is now a few feet away from where the original meander line was drawn. The meander line simply provided a reference point for the initial grant, not a fixed boundary.