Where Will You Get Water?

Most subdivisions that you can build a custom home in will have city water already piped to the front of each property, with a meter near the street where the city or water company can come along and read your water usage. If they are techno-savvy, they will also have a way to read the meter electronically using a type of wireless radio frequency reading or cellular type connection to get data into their systems automatically. But if you don't have water to the lot, you may get the opportunity to have a well drilling company find water underground.

There are two people you should speak with during the due diligence phase regarding the well you will put in. They should both come back with similar information. First, get a hold of someone at your local water resources board. Since my property is in the county boundaries, not the city, I had to call the county offices. They may need to call you back, but will have tons of good information.

My goal for this first call was to get as much information as possible about other wells in the subdivision and area and find out how hard it was for them to get water. My first discovery was that my next door neighbor lot has already drilled his well. The public records in my area have quite a few details, including the well logs that were kept as the driller punched the well.

My neighbors well was 200 feet deep. The first hit water at about 160 feet (a pleasant surprise), and they set their pump around 180 feet deep. The bad news is that they can only get about 10 gallons per minute. For residential use, you need closer to 20 gallons per minute, or have enough pressure tank to storage to store water and pressure for a period of time.

Another neighbor, just outside the subdivision drilled his well about 250 feet. He can get about 20 gallons per minute. Given these scenarios, it seems that we will need a bit more depth for a quality well. Rick, from the water resources board, said that we may need to go as deep as 300 to 400 feet to have plenty of water.

Rick also told us that without irrigation water rights we can only irrigate 1/2 acre. Since I have 5 acres here, a lot of the property will need to stay as sage brush covered rather then be landscaped. I am good with that. But if I do want to irrigate the whole property, I will have to obtain a water right from somewhere, whether purchased, traded or somehow obtained. There are a limited number of shares of irrigation water in the tributaries to the Boise river, and so beyond the 1/2 acre, we will be limited.

For irrigation you can collect ground water in a pond, and water as much as you want. I did ask him about putting in a pool. He said that it would be fine, and even though it uses a lot of water, it falls under an exception to the rule that you can't put water from the well into an irrigation pond.

The second person you should speak to is a well driller. I got a hold of Monte from Water Pro Services. He will be doing some research and then contacting me. I will give you more information as I have it.

In other news, when I went by yesterday, my neighbor down the hill in the meadow area broke ground on his home. Looks like they will be putting in a basement. I will add some pictures here soon.