Boreholes

[Erichalfbee]

Does anybody here have experience of sinking a borehole into their land?
Not only did our "allotment" in our meadow suffer last year but in summer our small natural pond gets very low since the neighbouring farmer drained his field that surround our little plot.
I thought that a borehole might be just the answer.
I've looked around on the internet but it's all a bit confusing about surveys and permissions.
Rather than getting a geological survey done could we use the water catchment maps we had in our original house survey ?(we have a septic tank and the environment agency insisted that our vendors had a survey done)
There is so much water about(just not in the right place) I wish we could just sink one on the quiet.................

 

[idg]

We have two boreholes on our land that were dug probably 40 years ago. They work on a stirrup pump action. As I understand the holes were dug by hand and go down some 15 to 20 feet. At the bottom of the hole is a brick lined sump that the bottom of the pump extends into.
The pumps used to work quite well, but about 10 years ago there were some local land alterations which dropped the water table. You can can still get some water out but it does tend to dry up in the summer.
I think if you could get a mechanical device to bore a hole, you would be onto a winner, but the graft involved in digging a hole manually has certainly put me off making it deeper.
As for the rules and regs, I thought it was an offence to take water from or put water into a water course. Is the ground a water course. If it was me I wouldn't ask for permission as I don't see how it differs from having a water butt. It's just that it is collecting below ground.
Good luck with your project.

 

[mbc]

Does anybody here just sink one on the quiet.................

My tactics exactly if I knock off early on a friday

 

[kathrynat]

We had a borehole sunk a few years ago and I don't remember getting permission from anyone to do it. I think( but could be wrong) that an extraction licence might be needed if you were to extract a large volume of water. We just pump enough to fill a few water troughs for our livestock

 

[For want of a better word]

May be out of date but six years ago neighbor dibbed me in to South West water as I had a water catchment tank sunk 2 meters into the ground to collect rainwater.

SWW could not do anything as I was collecting rainwater that had not penetrated more than 2 meters into the ground.
Also you can excavate to 2 meters without planning consent.

I also extracted water from a brook to water the garden... fortunately we were not more than 500 meters above the HAT ( ask JBM !) and according to the lass from the Environment agency we could take as much water as we wanted.. provided we did not... " produce energy " from it!

So dig a bloody great big pond and line it with bentonite... let the rain do the rest!

Yeghes da

 

[For want of a better word]

My tactics exactly if I knock off early on a friday

POETS day !

Yeghes da

 

[dexter's shed]

if you have access to mains water, then it can be done with pvc waste pipes, they are used to bore down through the ground, with the hose inserted inside to flush out dirt in the pipe, just look on you tube theirs loads of ways to do it

 

[pargyle]

There are no regulations regarding the sinking of boreholes, you can put it anywhere as long as it is on your land ... a good water diviner will tell you where to site it and you really to understand the nature of the contract of borehole drillers ... You can get charged for 'dry' wells and a good diviner will have insurance to cover this eventuality and to cover your backside.

All underground water belongs to the government but you are permitted to extract up to 20 m3 per day without an extraction licence ... that's a lot of water !

You should aim to site it more than 50m away from a septic tank and it it is to be used as a source of drinking water you have to have it tested regularly for it's purity.

There are lots of underground water sources at different levels and not all of them are potable so you need to be careful that the water you are drilling for is the right kind and not stuffed full of minerals that make it brackish.

NOT a DIY Job in my opinion ... call in the experts.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Thanks everybody.....Might be this summer's project.