Blowing out the well

When we found an old well pipe on our land, we were ecstatic! But, it turns out there's more to it than we anticipated. It could be dry, although there was standing water in the pipe. It could be plugged up, filled with clay somewhere down there. Or, it could be non-potable water.

found well pipe

So, we called many people, trying to figure out what to do next. We have some options. The well drillers came out last Friday to blow out the well, so we could see if it was worth pursuing.

well drillers arrive

They stuck a plastic tube down as far as it would go and turned on the air compressor.

blowing out the well

There were several eruptions of nasty, black water, spewing about 6 -8 feet high, and a small pond formed with all of the water they pushed out. It disappeared back into the sand within a couple of  hours.

Lots of yucky water

The well drillers measured the pipe they sent down and decided the well was 28 feet deep before it hit bottom, and seemed to have a good fill rate. They recommended testing the water, which we will do to see if it is potable or not. But, on the plus side, we have a usable well, even if we can only use it for irrigation.

We also took a load of compost up to the land to dump in the field where we plan to plant the hemp. It looks small, but we have many more loads, if we have time to move it. Ideally we will get the pigs out there to mix it up with the sand, and add some more soil and organic matter if we can. This is where Richard wants to put the big greenhouse, if we can raise enough funds on our Indiegogo campaign.

compost in planting spot

There seems to be several small peat bogs around the area. This is north of our land by a few feet. We have some of this on our property as well. We are planning on collecting it and adding it to the planting space.

peat field north of land

Next step: bring in some road base for the driveway and parking area. We have gotten the van stuck twice now with the big stock trailer behind it. Yes, we got it out with some ingenuity and misc. supplies laying around, but it's not fun and a major time loss. So, we are hoping to have a dump truck of road base dumped this next week, rent a skid steer next weekend to spread it and clear some more space for the office to be built.

We are still moving stuff to storage and whatever is not valuable out to the land. We are working on our power system and will put that in the office space. We are still waiting on delivery of a cistern. We tested the water system in the RV, which seem to be working. The toilet leaks, so we need a new one of those, and the furnace doesn't work, but overall, this was a bargain camper at $700. We may just put in a composting toilet in place of the RV toilet. That will save our water. I'm hoping it's going to be warm enough in a couple of weeks that we won't need heat in the camper. We can always find a propane heater, I guess.

On Tuesday: Fencing.