ALMOST BEEKEEPING - RELATED TOPICS > FARMING & COUNTRY LIFE
Digging a Shallow Well
.30WCF:
--- Quote from: BeeMaster2 on December 06, 2021, 01:47:04 pm ---Nice job.
I have dug three shallow wells. The first one I used 2 garden hoses and went down about 30 feet. The last 2 I used a 1 1/4? hand screw wood drill bit and 1 1/4? pipe to go through 8? of clay the first time and 15 feet of clay the second time. Below the clay is 60? of water saturated sand. I stopped both right below the clay. Then you have to pump it out to make a dome under the clay. They still pick up a lot of sand.
Jim Altmiller
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That?s pretty cool Jim. Have you ever pumped the water faster than it could filter back in?
The well point Ace was asking me about would work nice in your situation. They are pretty tough and should screen out most of the sand if you ever have to do it again. I think I hit rock with mine. The well point, https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/water-source-well-point-1-1-4-in-x-36-in-1028022?cm_mmc=feed-_-GoogleShopping-_-Product-_-1028022&gclid=CjwKCAiAhreNBhAYEiwAFGGKPJJR9c6WeOlkD5IgLBfF6twgrnwlxnRKH0E-GXk7gN9FkZOVk429DBoCTm0QAvD_BwE , screws onto a piece of 1-1/4 inch galvanized water pipe and you drive it down, add a section and drive some more. It?s basically a screened pick up tube meant to be pounded into the ground. Even if you had to drill through your clay if it?s too tough to drive, you could sink that way down in the sand below.
Now that I have new leather on my pump I am going to have to try again and see if I can pick up the water or if I got stuck shy of having a reliably renewable water source. That would be silly I?d I actually accomplished this 5 years ago, but never realized the bottom leather was miss-aligning the stopper.
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Acebird:
--- Quote from: .30WCF on December 06, 2021, 09:14:12 am ---
About 5 years ago I did. I hit something about 15 feet down and couldn't get any farther. It has water in the pipe, but I never could draw it up.
That pitcher pump was sitting under the shed all this time and the leather went bad. I cut some new leather yesterday and replaced it. When I had it apart I discovered they they had misaligned the flapper in the bottom of the pump. I cut new leather and put it in right. I should give that old well point a try.
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You might try pressurizing the point to clean out the clay and debris that clogged the screens if you haven't done it already.
.30WCF:
I did not.
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Acebird:
--- Quote from: BeeMaster2 on December 06, 2021, 01:47:04 pm ---Nice job.
I have dug three shallow wells. The first one I used 2 garden hoses and went down about 30 feet. The last 2 I used a 1 1/4? hand screw wood drill bit and 1 1/4? pipe to go through 8? of clay the first time and 15 feet of clay the second time. Below the clay is 60? of water saturated sand. I stopped both right below the clay. Then you have to pump it out to make a dome under the clay. They still pick up a lot of sand.
Jim Altmiller
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The back of my lot is wet and gets flooded during heavy rain. I dug down about 2ft with the tractor and hit pure sand and then dug another 2ft down. I needed the dirt to fill low spots and to raise the ground around the leach field so the rain water would run away from it. Now the heavy rain goes in the hole I dug and drains in a day or so. I don't believe in irrigating the lawn like most do around here but it would be easy to drive a point in FL sand down here.
Michael Bush:
I dug one once with a screw type post hole digger, a lot of pipe and a makeshift derrick. Went 25'. Put in 4" plastic pipe with saw cuts in the bottom 10 feet, filled outside the pipe with gravel and capped with some concrete.
My well at my house is hand dug and lined with limestone. About 24" in diameter. It's 42 feet deep and the water level is 16' when the creek isn't flooding. If the creek floods long enough, the water level rises to about 4' which is 2' higher than my basement floor...
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