Doesn't shocking it mean chlorine? I hate to sound crazy, but we have to drink the water here and the thought of that chlorination makes me cringe.

We have a sulphur filter already. And we also installed a sediment filter to shut these people up.

You're right--they probably wanted out.

I hope we have a new buyer soon!

Thanks for the encouragement, L!

Yes, shocking means chlorine, but then you run enough water through it so there is no chlorine left in the water. You do not have to use the water while there is chlorine still in the water. We are currently going through the process as our water also tested positive for Coliform bacteria. Our county will not retest the water until the chlorine is out of the well.

Did you figure out what caused the positive test result? That is also an important step. Shocking is only a temporary solution because it only gets out the Coliform bacteria that was in the system when it was shocked. Eliminating the situation that caused the bacteria can be the permanent solution.

Well, we installed a UV filter for that exact reason: Shocking is only temporary. Our well is surrounded by trees and a natural spring, so I'm hoping the coliform bacteria was from plant decay; how would we know what the cause of result was? I am not too sure if I can get a positive coliform test now that we have the UV system.

You'd think the UV filter would have been an acceptable solution to the people who wanted to buy it...

I don't believe that coliform comes from plant decay. It pretty much only lives in the guts of animals, large and small.

You have un-harmful coliform bacteria in your digestive tract right now. (Unless you presently taking a course of antibiotics that is.)

Having a positive water test just means that there is some entry point for the bacteria to enter your water supply system as it doesn't exist in water that arises from the aquifer or stone formation, unless your area has bigger problems than just your private water supply.

Chances are that somewhere in your piping, pump, casing, pressure tank or in-house distribution network you have (or had at some recent time) a point source for the contamination from some variety of, um, animal wastes, not to put too fine a point on it. Or did at some point and the coliform has remained in your water supply ever since. Shocking a well, while temporary, may be enough to knock down the problem beasts so that they essentially are eliminated. Until the next time this litttle entry point is contaminated by more waste.

I once lived in a house with a shallow well that a squirrel fell in (at least we hoped it was a squirrel, not something grosser) and drowned. (We didn't know when that happened.) And then decayed. (Boy, we REALLY knew when that happened!!) Talk about stinkin' up the joint!

It was unimaginably foul, and naturally tested sky-high for coliform for awhile. Nobody would have drunk the water when it smelled so bad; nobody could stand to even run the water because of the smell. We had to drop a trash pump down the well and repeatedly pump the water out. It was spring fed so it refilled every 36 hours. And dump gallons of Clorox down it every day or so for weeks afterward.

Eventually it cleared completely up and became potable again, though by then I had moved out.

You can bet that as soon we bought our current farm, i found the shallow well top and equipped it with such a tightly sealing inspection top that nothing could fall in, ever. Not going through that again.

As the above poster noted, yes, shocking usually involves chlorine. You put it in and then run the water until you can smell it coming out of all the taps (and flush the toilet, too.). Then shut it off and don't run the water for an overnight or day to give it enough "dwell" time within the system to find and kill the coliform. Then run the water until you can't smell it any more. Then wait a certain amount of time required by your Health Dept. and then test again. A second positive test after a thorough, well-performed shocking would need human pathogen-specific testing to determine if this particular one is going to make you sick.

if it is, you need to find where the entry point is, and correct the problem, and maybe do what you have already done, which is treat everything with UV. That is quite effective, and pretty benign to humans who use the water afterward.

Don't cross that bridge until you come to it. If you've been drinking the water up til now, chances are it isn't a big problem. Because the dangerous e. coli bugs make you realy, really sick, so you'd know it by now.

Good luck!

L.

Bears poop in the woods. Cows poop in the fields. Rain washes that into low points. The issue is the point of infiltration from that animal waste into your well. Without that identified and fixed, I would have walked too. A UV treatment is great to have, but you want to fix the root of the problem before you try to sell it again. Because the root cause may be a cracked casing that can't be repaired without a lot more expense than drilling new. Your buyers may be right. A new well may be the correct fix.

The well casing is not there just to prevent collapse in soft soil, but also to prevent surface runoff and the contamination it always contains from entering the well.

Coliform in a well has to come from surface runoff contamination entering somewhere. It isn't present 170 feet down or however deep they had to dig your well. Where is it getting into your well from? THAT is what you need to identify.

My well isn't that deep GreenDesigns, but I'm concerned by what you're saying.

How do I identify this?

I think what Green-Designs is pointing out is what I also have: that the coliform isn't coming from deep in the rock formation where your well is drawing its water. It's coming from some point in the casing, piping, supply lines etc. that brings the water up to the surface and then on into your house and out through the tap.

Unless your well is like mine here on the farm (a hole lined with laid up stones) it was drilled into rock, then above the rock the hole was line with metal pipes in the soil running up to the surface (the casing). Depending on your system design either a pump is lowered down into the well through the casing and pipes come up from the pump with the water or pipes with a foot valve are lowered down through the casing into the standing water with a suction pump attached above that to raise the water.. At the well head the water is redirected below the frost level typical for your area in pipes through the ground into your house. From thence to a pressure tank and then out to your taps, etc.

Somwhere in that system surface water carrying coliform bacteria from some critters' gut (large or small, human or non-human) entered the system contaminating it. It could have been a one-time event, but most likely the breach is still there, and even if more bacteria is not now coming, it could in the future. And any thing that increases soil water (on surface or just in the soil) carries the possibility that it will happen again.

The other possibility here is that the breach is inside your house, and so unaffacted by high soil moisture. For instance perhaps you have a sewer drain and supply line too close together and a small leak has formed in both allowing an exchange of contents. Not likely, but it could happen. Or perhaps you have had a back flow of coliform carrying water through a tap connection - washing machine feed hose, an icemaker supply line or an outdoor hose bib is where this might have happened. Maybe a plumbing repair introduced it originally.

That's why it's possible that a single, or even a series of shocks might eliminate it. But also why, if it continues to test positive, you may need to do more work to find and fix the problem.

I wouldn't hesitate to shock it and then retest, upstream of your UV system, of course. The bad test is "on the record" now anyway, so you've nothing to lose. It's inconvenient to shock, and a little stinky as you will have to run the chlorinated water out. But maybe it will do the trick. Your county (or state) health department has dealt with this countless times before and can give you good advice on how to do it. They won't think you are Typhoid Mary out to infect the whole region. It's just a common well problem that needs to be addressed. Scads of people with private supply systems have been through this. Unless your water supply is located in an area with tons of animal manure run-off, chances are it will be no big deal to address.

That's where your buyers went off the deep end. If you want to live in an area with private water and/or septic systems you have to expect this sort of thing from time to time. (The drowned squirrel that decayed in my well, was unusual, though. Definitely a worst case example!>)

HTH

L.

Both drought and unusually heavy rains can contaminate wells, as can apparently, one small squirrel.

Here's a diagnostic method to split out where they are coming from.

First, check uphill from the well along the aquifer for unusual accumulations of manure, a new corral, or a change to the drainage, or a new well (changes water level, can cause inflow from surface water)

then check the system:
1 - Take a test as close to the well head as possible.

2 - Take a test from the faucet closest to the well

If you have approximately equal number of coliforms in both, it's on the well side of the test spot. Many coliforms are free-living non-pathogens and can set up a colony in a water system, living off very little in the way of nutrients. Shocking the system will kill off the colony.

If test #1 has significantly fewer coliforms, you have a problem with a storage tank, backflow into your distribution system, or the coliforms set up housekeeping somewhere in the piped. (unused plumbing loops should be disconnected and capped)

people who freak out about bacteria should not look at houses in the country, with wells and septic tanks.

I am friendly with a couple who shock their well every year, or maybe it's every other year. I thought they were misguided in doing that, because in my opinion, every time the cover is off the well, there is a chance an animal could fall in there and die. Liriodendron's story is not the fist time I've heard of this happening. Now the process seems even sillier, since the germ-phobic wife is drinking contaminated water most of the time, and not getting to the root of the problem (if there even is a problem. Maybe shocking the well makes them feel better)

They nattered at me about shocking my well. My water tastes fine, has no smell, gets the clothes clean. It does what I need it to do. I did go so far as to purchase a test kit, and sure enough, the water actually is fine.

I had no idea "spring water" was a bad thing, considering what the local company gets for it once it's bottled.

"people who freak out about bacteria should not look at houses in the country, with wells and septic tanks." The most germ-phobic person I ever met washed her hand frequently, and sprayed everything she touched with Lysol. She was out sick more than any other colleague I ever had.

If you have irrigation for the yard, and it is connected to the well you should check to make sure that you have an anti siphoning valve. If not the water that isstored in the lines of the irrigation system can be pulled back into the well. This water can be contaminated.

I thought they were misguided in doing that, because in my opinion, every time the cover is off the well, there is a chance an animal could fall in there and die.

We just shocked our well and we did not have to remove the cover in order to do so. We just had to remove the small plug on the cap.

E. Coli is often not in itself all that harmful (though there are some very dangerous strains, ask the beef industry).

It is more of an indicator that the well has become contaminated by animal feces, often by surface runoff.

There may be other dangerous bacteria (and even viruses) present from the contamination source.

If the contamination is a single event produced by excessive runoff from local weather, shocking the well may be all that is required.

If the contamination is from a failed septic field, shocking is unlikely to have any long term benefit.

Since droughts are not really 'single events' they can result in a prolonged period of contamination.

As far as springs vs. wells, there is not really all that much difference.

We sold our house, with a well, last year. We lived there 40 years and had the well tested yearly. There were a few times we had to chlorinate the well due to coliform. After some investigation, we discovered that our house was built on old farm land. The coliform would appear after heavy rains and was wash off from the soil.

One year it repeatedly tested positive but we found out our neighbors septic was leaking and our well was downhill from it.

They put in a new septic and it solved the problem.

Before we listed our house, we had our well tested and it was negative. We decided to treat the well anyway just to play it safe.

When the buyers inspected the well it came back clean.

Why didn't you treat your well before listing?? My Realtor suggested it and does so to any seller before listing.

Its too bad you didn't because now you will have to disclose the problem to the next buyers.

Jane

We didn't think about it; assumed everything was okay. You know what they say about assuming. :-/

We do live on an old farm and there is a creek that runs near septic. I'm hoping this resolves it.

A farm creek running near your septic leach field that is involved in contamination of your drinking water is a tri-fecta of bad - and potentially very expensive to remediate - problems.

Perhaps you meant something different?

I certainly hope so.

Well heads usually have required distance separations from septic fields. Septic leach fields have required separations from surface waters (creeks).

The only positive thing here is that if it's an "old farm", most likely the chances are that any run-off from animal husbandry has passed into non-damaging, benign beasties. Like well-aged manure, it becomes safe, over time and with degradation.

OTOH, run-off from active husbandry is the source of the worst e.coli drinking water problems.

(I live on an old farm -very old, but still in active animal production until the day before we bought it 25 years ago. My water supply and sanitary arrangements wouldn't pass any modern standard, so we test regularly. These are commonplace issues for me. Before we bought the farm, the previous owner had to test regularly, too, in order to maintain his certification to operate a dairy farm. You need lots and lots of water to run a dairy farm, and it all has to be potable.)

L.

I meant old farm. Old farm owner sold it to a developer about 12 years ago for millions.

The UV filter has given us great results with 0 bacteria, tested this week. We've never been sick either.

But now I have to sell my house...