Slow recovery well options


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Old 08-30-14, 09:13 AM
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Slow recovery well options

Hello all,
I'm a homeowner in California with an 8" well drilled in the 50s. Up until this drought it was fine. But now I can only run a hose for about 10 minutes before it runs out of water, after doing a bunch of bucket tests I think the yield is somewhere around 2-3 GPM. Not enough to run sprinklers etc. for very long.

My parcel is ag with a couple of horses, trees, etc, but got incorporated into city limits and now the city won't let me drill a new well. City water is really expensive to connect to and ongoing. So I'm really stuck, and trying to extend the life of the current well as long as possible. I thought maybe a storage tank would get me by during the dry season? Or maybe well reconditioning?

Current well is:
8" cable drilled, 1955, steel casing
133' deep
Static water at 103'
Pump 1.5hp 7gpm set at 123'
85gal pressure tank w 22 gal usable

Any info or suggestions you all might have would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Justin
 
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Old 08-30-14, 09:29 AM
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Boy, you are not far from out of luck. With the static level at 103' and the pump only 20' below that you don't have much to work with especially with everyone else in the state pumping the snot out of the aquifer. I think your tank idea is probably the best option. I'm really torn though on how much money to invest. I can understand wanting to get by with what you've got and if you can make it last until conditions improve you might be OK. Your static level is so low already and with everyone pumping you may not have much time left with the well. It would be bad to invest a couple grand in a tank, controls and pump only to have the well run dry in a couple months.
 
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Old 08-30-14, 03:00 PM
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Here is how I would size the tank.
Calculate what each zone needs. To do that, try and determine how much water each sprinkler head uses, then add them up. As an example: A typical rotatory head uses 3GPM. Six of them = 18GPM. Use the biggest zone from here on out.

Then determine how many minutes you want to run -- 20 keeps my grass alive, but doesn't let it super lush. That's all I am looking to do until it rains again.

Back to our example, 18x20=360 gallons. That's enough for one zone to run 20 minutes. Then you fill up the tank again.

Don't water by the calendar, water by how much you need. If it's raining semi-regularly, my grass can go a week or too without any water at all, and I won't need to irrigate for months, but if the rain quits completely, it gets dried out and I have to start watering every day.

I walk on the grass and if it stays bent down it needs water. And try not to mow much either. Mowing dries it out. And sharpen your blade, you need it to cut, not fringe the top which dries it out even more.
 
 

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