It's a Gusher!

Whew! We are nearly there.

We had a bit of a setback on the well. We had water at 35 feet - but just before the driller was going to hook the well to the house, we got a letter from the health department. It seems they decided to implement a new procedure to get a well put in for all of us in the town. Previously, you worked with the well driller. You picked a location which the driller would review. You sunk the well. Got it hooked up, had the water tested by the health department, and were good to go. Now we had to send in a request to the health department. Even though the health department had already been to our place and had given us a verbal okay, they now were going to inspect all the steps of the well installation process. Would be okay if they were responsive, but the engineer was never around. Finally, the driller told them we were moving forward and was not going to wait for them. He was getting backed up with all the people in the area trying to get wells put in. Once he got a backhoe in, they finished the job in about 3 hours.

We had to let the well sit for ~ 6 hours, and then draw water from the well for about 2 hours till it ran clear. They shocked the well with chlorine, so we don't want to wash our clothes or drink a lot of water for a few days. It was running pretty clear after 1 hour. I let it run for over 2.5 hours to be safe, then ran all the faucets in the house to get the air out of the lines. Still has a strong chlorine smell, but we notice the water seems clearer without all the little calcium floaters we had with city water.

I'll have to clean up the yard. One of the sweet woodruff beds was tore up as they ran the water line to the house. They also tore up some of the yard near the shutoff valve for the city water line. I'll need to clean up the yard before the ground freezes. I don't want to look at this mess till next spring.