The back of our property is a mountain which slopes down on the end near the house and several springs issue out of this end. I believe 2 are on our land but there are several more in the area. The resulting streams from them all eventually combine and form a little creek which is the property line for a piece. This particular spring is going to be our water source for the house. Allen put a 1" copper pipe up in the spring just to be able to get samples of water easily and try to reduce the amount of dirt etc. If it tests out okay (and it should) we will dig a small reservoir and Allen wants to use a hydraulic ram to pump the water from here to the house where it will be filtered. I think we will use the reverse osmosis type filter probably but I need to do a little more research. Anybody have any experience with such things? Now, I don't understand anything about hydraulic rams or whatever but Allen does so that will be his job. We are trying to avoid using electricity to pump the water but I don't know if this will be possible. The flow just out of the copper pipe we put in is about 120 gallons/hour. There is much more actually coming out of the spring though and we have never observed this spring to dry up. Fred's (the man whom we aquired the land from) family used these springs over 70 years ago for their water supply so I think they are fairly reliable. There is water and gas etc. at the main road but to bring it back to the house would be a pretty good expense and I believe I would like spring water better anyway. I do not agree with flouridation in the water systems and even though I know chlorine is needed in city water, I don't like bathing in and drinking that either. So maybe this will work.
It was getting dark when I took these photos and on this one I used a flash. I thought it made a really funky effect with the water. The green stuff at the top is watercress which grows abundantly in these streams. I have heard that it will only grow in fairly pure water but I don't know. There are also these little cone-shaped snails that Fred calls "periwinkles" but I don't know much about them either. I will try to get a photo of them though.
The back of our property is a mountain which slopes down on the end near the house and several springs issue out of this end. I believe 2 are on our land but there are several more in the area. The resulting streams from them all eventually combine and form a little creek which is the property line for a piece. This particular spring is going to be our water source for the house. Allen put a 1" copper pipe up in the spring just to be able to get samples of water easily and try to reduce the amount of dirt etc. If it tests out okay (and it should) we will dig a small reservoir and Allen wants to use a hydraulic ram to pump the water from here to the house where it will be filtered. I think we will use the reverse osmosis type filter probably but I need to do a little more research. Anybody have any experience with such things? Now, I don't understand anything about hydraulic rams or whatever but Allen does so that will be his job. We are trying to avoid using electricity to pump the water but I don't know if this will be possible. The flow just out of the copper pipe we put in is about 120 gallons/hour. There is much more actually coming out of the spring though and we have never observed this spring to dry up. Fred's (the man whom we aquired the land from) family used these springs over 70 years ago for their water supply so I think they are fairly reliable. There is water and gas etc. at the main road but to bring it back to the house would be a pretty good expense and I believe I would like spring water better anyway. I do not agree with flouridation in the water systems and even though I know chlorine is needed in city water, I don't like bathing in and drinking that either. So maybe this will work.
It was getting dark when I took these photos and on this one I used a flash. I thought it made a really funky effect with the water. The green stuff at the top is watercress which grows abundantly in these streams. I have heard that it will only grow in fairly pure water but I don't know. There are also these little cone-shaped snails that Fred calls "periwinkles" but I don't know much about them either. I will try to get a photo of them though.
4 comments:
That spring is nicer than any of ours! Ours are a trickle unless it's rained a lot. We do have those same snails. Well I guess they're the same.
I wondered if that land was from Fred's family... had meant to ask you but you know how that goes. :)
Fred's family's old homestead is now that huge spread across the road from us. The land he owns now (and what we have now) he bought from a non-relative when he moved back to Alabama after retiring. I guess at one point his family did own it all because his brother is the one who built the old dam that made our land into a lake way back when. They must have sold off parts that no longer connected to the main part because of roads going in.
If I had a couple of springs like that, I wouldn't care that my dam leaked cuz the pool would stay full all of the time.
I had asked Allen if we couldn't get a bakhoe in and widen one part of the creek to make a little pool area. Just enough to soak in you know, but he said it would just fill back in with the flowing water. I don't know. The water coming out of the spring is COLD, so much so that we are considering a way to air condition with it also.
Post a Comment