Wetland & Drainage Permits in Walsh County, ND

Most of Walsh County's wetland regulation isn't about a federal Clean Water Act permit -- it runs through North Dakota's own surface-drainage law and the county's Water Resource District, which has already built one of the larger drainage projects in the region.

This page covers what's specific to Walsh County. For the general explanation, see the national guide.

The trigger: an 80-acre watershed, not the size of the wetland itself

Under North Dakota Century Code chapter 61-32, a landowner needs a state permit before draining any pond, slough, lake, or sheetwater area -- or any connected series of them -- whose total watershed (the land area draining into it, not just the wet spot itself) is 80 acres or more. That threshold catches a lot of ordinary Red River Valley farmland drainage work, not just large, obviously significant wetlands: a modest-looking slough can sit at the low point of an 80-plus-acre drainage area and still require a permit before it can be tiled, ditched, or otherwise drained. An "Application for Surface Drain" goes to the state Department of Water Resources, which in turn refers it to the local water resource district covering most of the affected watershed for review and approval.

That local water resource district, for Walsh County, is the Walsh County Water Resource District (WCWRD), run out of the Walsh County Courthouse in Grafton. Before a permit can be granted, state law requires an investigation into whether the proposed drainage will flood or otherwise adversely affect downstream land. If it will, the water resource board cannot issue the permit until the landowner obtains flowage easements from the affected downstream owners -- and those easements must be filed for record with the county recorder, meaning they show up in the chain of title. A buyer evaluating agricultural land with wet spots, or land downstream from a farm actively pursuing drainage, should ask directly whether any recorded flowage easements or pending drain permits touch the parcel.

Legal Drain 87: what an actual local drainage project looks like

Walsh County isn't a place where this framework is purely theoretical. At the request of local landowners, the WCWRD built Legal Drain 87, a roughly 2.9-mile, two-tiered drainage channel emptying into the Park River, engineered with self-sustaining floodplain "benches" on both sides intended to promote a more natural water flow rather than a simple ditch. The project was designed to boost drainage capacity and reduce erosion across an assessment area of almost 33,000 acres of agricultural land, with affected landowners voting on the project (in a March 2017 landowner vote) before construction proceeded. A 'legal drain' like this one isn't just a channel -- it comes with an ongoing assessment area, meaning land inside its benefit boundary can carry a recurring drainage-district assessment tied to the parcel, separate from ordinary property tax.

For a buyer, the practical takeaway is to ask two specific questions before closing on Walsh County farmland: whether the parcel sits inside the assessment area of Legal Drain 87 or any other WCWRD legal drain (which can mean an ongoing assessment obligation, but can also mean guaranteed outlet capacity that protects the land's yield potential), and whether any drainage work on or near the parcel is either currently permitted, pending, or the subject of a recorded flowage easement. The WCWRD can be reached through the Walsh County Courthouse at 600 Cooper Ave in Grafton, or by emailing completed water-resource forms to wcwrb@nd.gov -- that office, not the state Department of Water Resources directly, is the first call for a parcel-specific answer.

Wetlands and Drainage Permits in Walsh County, North Dakota

The trigger: an 80-acre watershed, not the size of the wetland itself

Legal Drain 87: what an actual local drainage project looks like

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