water well

[lliefveld]

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Did you have the water tested. How about for arsenic? Some arsenic compounds taste really sweet.


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I guess I should have clarified. It's 'sweet', meaning no taste of chlorine or other chemicals that I"m used to in our city water here in So. Cal. It tastes pure and clear and refreshing.

[Pat]

lliefveld, I have tasted water that was as you describe, pure, clear, and refreshing with no "off" flavor notes, no odd smells or any aftertaste. It tested poorly and was marginally safe for human consumption.

My current well water tastes as good as water can taste and tests quite safe but to be on the safe side you need to retest every year. Living in an old oil field from when practices were much less environmentaly friendly than they are now we never know when a well may go brackish or have any of a number of polution problems. Nitrates are also a problem and can result from various agricultural activities.

Water is just too important to take for granted. I can recall in my youthful ignorance drinking directly from streams when back packing high in the mountains were there was very little human presence only to round a bend and find a dead cow in the stream about 100 ft from my last refreshing drink. I have also had water scooped from concavities in the rocks. We strained out the things we could see swiming around in it, added Halezone and Iodine and then used Wyler's fruit drink mix to camoflage the taste. Nothing quite like Wylers to cover the taste of water purificatioin tablets. Of course nowdays I have a pump with a filter that produces Sparklets quality water.

Don't take purity for granted and know that clarity and taste, as important as they are, do not adequately substitute for proper analysis.

[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[lliefveld]

Good points, Pat.

I don't think it's been tested yet, but that's definitely on our list, and I'm sure it's probably required before we get our final inspection on our house.

Everyone around here has hard rock wells, and they've all tested just fine in our area. The only problems that people have encountered have been in a different area of town, and it's been primarily sulphur.

There's no agriculture 'upstream' from us... unless you count the marijuana farms that people sneak into the National Park, so we don't have to worry about pesticides sinking into the ground.

I have to laugh at your description of drinking from 'pure clear' streams, only to find a dead cow upstream. Here in Southern California you can't drink from a stream without getting guardia. In Canada, when I went on a 6-day trail ride, we drank from the stream all the time, and the guide made coffee and lemonade with water from the stream. I'll tell you, it made me pretty nervous.

[turnkey4099]

Quote: I have to laugh at your description of drinking from 'pure clear' streams, only to find a dead cow upstream. Here in Southern California you can't drink from a stream without getting guardia. In Canada, when I went on a 6-day trail ride, we drank from the stream all the time, and the guide made coffee and lemonade with water from the stream. I'll tell you, it made me pretty nervous.
End quote

I used to water from the small creek running by the place. We are right on the highway. One day while I was at work, my wife watched some young guys pull in with a steaming engine, disconnect the sprinkler, fill their radiator, one took a big drink and just tossed the running hose on the ground. I wondered later how far they made it as that stream runs through a barnyard just 1/4 mile up the road.

Harry K

[Pat]

lliefveld, Make sure your minimum requirements are met irrespective of whatever is levied on you by Government as you're drinking it, they aren't. If that means you have to take some time to become informed on the topic then that is the cost of personal responsibility in place of depending on government to do your thinking for you. I don't ignore Governmental standards but I don't blindly accept them either as there is a history of their being wrong at times.

Our drinking without treating was above 6000 ft in Baja California Norte near Picacho Diablo (over 14000 ft and highest spot in Baja.) The cow was at a lower elevation, on the way up. That taught us a valuable lesson and we waited till we were a bit higher near the headwaters of the streams before dipping our "Sierra" cups.

Cowboy coffee is traditionally boiled and isn't so dangerous but lemonade sounds like it wouldn't do much purifying. We used Wyler's lemonade mix to help kill the taste of Halezone and Iodine when we used purification tablets in obviously biologically active water.

Then when you think you are safe... there are other ways besides dead cows to endanger you. We are on rural water. One of the GOOD OLE BOYS operating the system didn't do too good and we received a mailing listing various symptoms we might have experienced when the water was insufficiently treated (various gastrointestinal upsets.) This along with a notice that the employee was being sent to school on the system operation. Luckily we were drinking our well water at the time and missed out of the "fun." We are drinking rural water now but using our own filtration system on it.

Annual water testing is a simple and innexpensive insurance policy. A lot of well water that used to be safe isn't now. There has to be a first time for the quality reduction. It is often a slow change that would not be noticed early without testing.

It has been said that the difference between the third world and us is that there you can't drink the water and here you can't breathe the air. A gross oversimplification. There are places in Texas where decades of laundry detergent have penetrated the aquafer and you get a "head" of foam on a glass of tap water.

With luck your "hard rock" water will be clean and pure for as long as ou use it. Remember, water wasn't greated at great depths. The aquafer is recharged from surface sources.



[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]