4 Well Water Tips For Weathering A Drought
Droughts can be frightening for owners of existing wells and individuals considering installing a new well or purchasing a property with one. While droughts affect everyone in an area regardless of where their water originates, wells place more responsibility for water management on the homeowner. Since droughts are unpredictable, it's important to understand how they affect your home's well water.
While there's no simple answer to how any individual homeowner should respond to droughts, these four tips will help you manage your home's water, protect your well equipment, and weather even severe dry spells.
1. Gather Information
Knowing as much about your well as possible is useful, even if you aren't currently experiencing or expecting a drought. You should know the well's location, the make and model of your pump, the age of your pump, and, most critically, your well depth. Well depth is often one of the most important factors for groundwater resiliency during droughts.
Deeper wells can typically handle periods of prolonged drought with less trouble than shallow wells. If your well suddenly stops producing water during a drought, its current depth will be a useful clue when diagnosing the problem and attempting to devise a solution.
2. Add Storage Tanks
Storage tanks are a typical solution for low-yield wells. Low-yield wells don't produce enough water for peak demand, so adding storage provides a buffer when demand exceeds available capacity. While storage tanks can't solve an ongoing drought, installing storage capacity can help during future periods of low recharge.
3. Minimize Usage
Most reliable and reasonably deep wells shouldn't require extreme conservation except in severe droughts, but minimizing optional usage is often a good idea during dry periods. If your area is experiencing a moderate drought, avoid watering your lawn or washing your car too often. You may also want to reduce your usage of water-heavy appliances, such as your dishwasher or washing machine.
While these steps may seem inconvenient, they're a good way to hedge against worsening conditions. By conserving water now, you'll be less likely to experience problems if the drought continues.
4. Recognize Warning Signs
Residential wells rarely go permanently "dry." Instead, usage temporarily exceeds the well's recharge rate, causing the groundwater level to drop below the pump's inlet. You will usually experience some warning signs first, however. For example, you may notice sputtering from faucets or heavy sedimentation. These symptoms may initially come and go as the well's water level recharges.
Contact a well water expert immediately if you notice any of these problems. Running your pump dry can cause damage, and waiting for your well to stop producing water is rarely a good idea. By contacting an expert, you can diagnose the problem and determine if you should take action, such as increasing your well depth or lowering your pump. For more information, contact a company like Golden Gate Well Drilling & Water Conditioning.
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