Digging a well on your property can be an excellent way to access fresh groundwater, but it requires careful planning and understanding of various factors, especially if you are going to do it by yourself without ny heavy equipment. From soil types to water availability and quality, here's a detailed guide to help you through the process.
Types of Soil and Their Impact on Digging
First and foremost, you should find out what type of soil you have on your property and how deep would you expect to hit rock
There are a few ways you can determine what type of soil you have on your property, but the easiest one is the Hand Texturing Method. To do this test, scoop a handfull of soil and moisten it. Squeez the soil in your fist as hard as you can. Now, when you open up your fist if the soil feels gritty and falls apart immediately, then you have a sandy soil. If it feels smooth, but doesn't stick together, then it's silty soil. And finally, if it feels sticky and retains its shape, this is clay soil. Rocky soil I think is self-describing.
Another method to determine what type of soil you have and how far down you can expect bedrock and water, is to search for a geological map of your area, this is the most accurate method.
Here's a list of common types of soil and what you can expect from them:
1. Sandy Soil
- Ease of Digging: Easy
- Characteristics: Loose and easy to move, drains well but can collapse if not properly supported.
- Considerations: Ensure proper casing to prevent cave-ins.
2. Clay Soil
- Ease of Digging: Moderate to Difficult
- Characteristics: Sticky and dense, holds shape well but can be hard to dig through manually.
- Considerations: Requires more effort and possibly heavy machinery for deeper wells.
3. Silty Soil
- Ease of Digging: Moderate
- Characteristics: Fine particles, smooth texture, retains moisture, and can be slippery.
- Considerations: Stability is good, but drainage can be an issue, necessitating good casing.
4. Loamy Soil
- Ease of Digging: Easy to Moderate
- Characteristics: Balanced mixture of sand, silt, and clay, fertile and easy to work with.
- Considerations: Generally stable and well-draining, suitable for manual digging.
5. Rocky Soil
- Ease of Digging: Difficult
- Characteristics: Contains a significant amount of rocks and gravel, which can impede digging.
- Considerations: Heavy machinery is often required to break through the rock layers.
6. Bedrock
- Ease of Digging: Very Difficult
- Characteristics: Solid rock layer beneath the soil, nearly impossible to penetrate manually.
- Considerations: Requires specialized drilling equipment.
Determining Water Availability
It's good to determine if there's water availability in a property before you even buy it. One of the best methods is to ask neighbours about it and see if they have wells, how deep they are, how much water there is and what the water quality is. If that's not an option, then here are some other methods you can use:
1. Geological Surveys
- Method: Hire a professional geologist or hydrologist to conduct a survey.
- Benefit: Provides a detailed understanding of the underground water sources and their depths.
2. Water Table Maps
- Method: Consult local water table maps which show average water levels in your area.
- Benefit: Offers a preliminary idea of where water may be found.
3. Dowsing
- Method: An age-old practice where a dowser uses rods or pendulums to locate water.
- Benefit: Controversial but still used in some areas as a supplementary method.
Checking Water Quality
Once you've reached water, it’s crucial to ensure it's safe for use. Here’s how:
1. Initial Inspection
- What to Check: Color, odor, and taste.
- Indicators: Clear, odorless, and neutral-tasting water is a good sign, but not a guarantee of safety.
2. Water Testing Kits
- Method: Use a home water testing kit to check for basic contaminants like bacteria, nitrates, and pH levels.
- Benefit: Quick and affordable preliminary assessment.
3. Professional Water Testing
- Method: Send a water sample to a certified laboratory for comprehensive testing.
- Benefit: Accurate detection of a wide range of contaminants including heavy metals, chemicals, and pathogens.
I would encourge all of you to send water samples to certified laboratories before you start consuming it. This is the only way to ensure that the water is safe for drinking as all the other methonds can't detect heavy metals and other chemicals and pathogens. Having done that it's good to check your water regularly, at least once a year, since groundwater conditions can change over time due to environmental factors
Diggin the well
This part is the hardest if you want to do it by yourself. I would recommend seeking professional help with heavy machinery if it's expected that the groundwater is more than 6 meters (20 feet) down. If it's less than that and there is no bedrock, then using shovels, pickaxes and buckets is enough. There's another method for manual 'drilling', here's a link to a youtube video that shows how it's done.
Happy homesteading!