Water Wells and Water Witches

[ASRG]

We used to have an old boy in our area who was unreal at witching water wells. He died a few years ago. About ten years ago I went on a little "water well drilling frenzy" (there was a special government program). I got three wells drilled. 160 feet/12 gpm.
140 ft/8gpm. 50 ft./50 gpm(actually couldn't bail it fast enough to measure).
I seldom water any cows out of any of them as I have natural flowing springs that never freeze up. The best one is 68 gpm.

[dluther]

You are a very lucky person we have one well that give trouble the end of Jan. but we got it fixed . No fun working with that stuff when it's cold. Now we have trouble with calves with a fast cold or what ever.

[ALLFARMER]

Some companies offer geophysical science based
methods for searching for water quality and
quantity. Lots of wells here have too much iron. I
asked Alberta environment how close to a creek I
could drill a water well, their answer.....no
regulation/laws against drilling even in a creek. I
may drill on high ground one day that the creek
loops around. Should be IMO clean plentiful
water.

[ASRG]

Old Jim was really good. Most people around here got him out to witch their wells. A lot of the water well drillers reccomended him. He even flew out to Manitoba once to witch a well for some big food company.
The guy was deadly....he told you how deep and how many gpm. He was sometimes a little out there....claimed he could tell the sex of a calf by putting his hand on the cows stomach! I don't know about that....but a local dairy farmer told me he could do it!
I knew a guy who could follow a water/gas line with coathanger....better than the "first call" guys with a metal detector. He tried to show me how, but I had absolutely no talent at it.
Also knew an oil field driller who told me his company found an old drunk in Saskatchewan who could witch oil! He witched five wells and they all came in like gangbusters! Unfortunately shortly after this he went on a spree and got run over and killed!

[oneoff]

Where's the science in palm readng; horoscopes and water or oil well witching.

And then those same believers always get all excited about "science based" being applied to everything else.

How do your brains handle that dilema; unless everything is actually "non based".

[ASRG]

Oneoff: No science. If it works you use it.

[wilagro]

There is nothing more futile than a "discussion" with a believer in dowsing as their logic can't be questioned without a huge kerfuffle and hard feelings. I don't believe for one minute in the witching process as it involves a lot of hokum and bunkum.

[ASRG]

wilagro: Sort of like religion? You either believe.... or you don't. Can't prove either one, but it is always your choice?

[oneoff]

Not so ASRG. If water well drilling were a profession; dowswers would be considered "Quacks".
But water well drilling is a trade; in Western provinces of Alberta and Sask (at least) it either voluntary or even more so regulated. As such; drillers reports are submitted and Elogs run as a matter of course. Improvements in that data would certainly be welcomed; but there is much data available for free that spans over a hundred years of searching for adequate water supplies.

As has been pointed out; it is futile to even debate this topic of dowsing. The dowswers will drag you down to their level; wear you out and beat you with their experience.
Suffice it to say that usable aquifers almost always lie in beds or some sort of formation with porosity; and have sufficient permeability to deliver fluids to the well bore in quantities sufficient for your intended use.
Now you can say that some people can put a pair of coathangers in their hands and receive a broadcast of AM radio stations through the fillings in their teeth. And someone else will testify that they have direct contact with aliens or even God.

But can those broadcasts be duplicated by two seperate "believers" (of your choice); independently and at the same time. Dowsing is dangerous nonsense when the public so easily believes it to contain facts that can be relied upon.

Now there are written water well driller sample reports; and Elogs of natural voltages produced by the borehole drilling fluids in contact with the relatively consistant formation beds that have been lain down over millions of years. Differring doses of Gamma rays are emmitted from sands and gravels as compared to clays (for instance) and those are also useful in documenting an areas water prospects. And single point resistance logs are commonly recorded to add information concerning more resistive sands and gravels as compared to clays which have a high porosity; but little effective permeability. And productive wells have been drilled, punched, dug,, bored and screwed for centuries. A good part of those efforts is recorded and available.

With such information from many wells; and productive (and non-productive) well data; a careful observer (and even an intelligent dowser) could easily give some educated guesses as to the chances and depth of potential aquifers. Which is still how the decision on new well location should be based.

On the other hand; I have never seen one shred of useful data recorded on any dowsers findings. If there were anything worth writing down that should have been submitted as data for all future water survey investigations and water wells that will be needed for future drill sites.

Do all the dowsing for wish for your entertainment; and don't be fooled by someone's with a piece of iron or wood dangling from their body.
If you want water that is 50 feet away from a power line; sufficently away from septic and animal fecal matter to minimize the chance of contamination; convenient to tying into existing pipelines and pressure tanks etc. etc. etc. then do a site survey to plan these considerations in conjunction with mapped and known aquifers in the vicinity.

Some areas will have near zero chance of success; while others will aprroach 100% in possibly your choice of several aquifers. Some drillers actually might have a 90% "success" rate; even when willingly taking on any problem sites that have had multiple "dryholes". And some sites still remain with no productive wells despite everyone's best efforts (and no doubt multiple dowsers as well).

And the doswer won't improve your chances by anything more than chance. Your choice of a reputable driller will be much more important in your success.

If you can't agree with any of the above; then it is a simple matter of contracting the drilling with the dowser who will with 100% certainty get exactly what he has you so firmly believing in.

DOWSERS WILL NOT IMPROVE THE OVERALL SUCCESS RATE of getting a "good" well. It's but a sad commentary on what faith can do.

But you'd be very wise to choose a driller familiar with local formations; drilling techniques and having thoroughly looked at all the data available. It's the driller who will confim your faith in that undeserving "dowser".

[oneoff]

Not so ASRG. If water well drilling were a profession; dowswers would be considered "Quacks".
But water well drilling is a trade; in Western provinces of Alberta and Sask (at least) it either voluntary or even more so regulated. As such; drillers reports are submitted and Elogs run as a matter of course. Improvements in that data would certainly be welcomed; but there is much data available for free that spans over a hundred years of searching for adequate water supplies.

As has been pointed out; it is futile to even debate this topic of dowsing. The dowswers will drag you down to their level; wear you out and beat you with their experience.
Suffice it to say that usable aquifers almost always lie in beds or some sort of formation with porosity; and have sufficient permeability to deliver fluids to the well bore in quantities sufficient for your intended use.
Now you can say that some people can put a pair of coathangers in their hands and receive a broadcast of AM radio stations through the fillings in their teeth. And someone else will testify that they have direct contact with aliens or even God.

But can those broadcasts be duplicated by two seperate "believers" (of your choice); independently and at the same time. Dowsing is dangerous nonsense when the public so easily believes it to contain facts that can be relied upon.

Now there are written water well driller sample reports; and Elogs of natural voltages produced by the borehole drilling fluids in contact with the relatively consistant formation beds that have been lain down over millions of years. Differring doses of Gamma rays are emmitted from sands and gravels as compared to clays (for instance) and those are also useful in documenting an areas water prospects. And single point resistance logs are commonly recorded to add information concerning more resistive sands and gravels as compared to clays which have a high porosity; but little effective permeability. And productive wells have been drilled, punched, dug,, bored and screwed for centuries. A good part of those efforts is recorded and available.

With such information from many wells; and productive (and non-productive) well data; a careful observer (and even an intelligent dowser) could easily give some educated guesses as to the chances and depth of potential aquifers. Which is still how the decision on new well location should be based.

On the other hand; I have never seen one shred of useful data recorded on any dowsers findings. If there were anything worth writing down that should have been submitted as data for all future water survey investigations and water wells that will be needed for future drill sites.

Do all the dowsing for wish for your entertainment; and don't be fooled by someone's with a piece of iron or wood dangling from their body.
If you want water that is 50 feet away from a power line; sufficently away from septic and animal fecal matter to minimize the chance of contamination; convenient to tying into existing pipelines and pressure tanks etc. etc. etc. then do a site survey to plan these considerations in conjunction with mapped and known aquifers in the vicinity.

Some areas will have near zero chance of success; while others will aprroach 100% in possibly your choice of several aquifers. Some drillers actually might have a 90% "success" rate; even when willingly taking on any problem sites that have had multiple "dryholes". And some sites still remain with no productive wells despite everyone's best efforts (and no doubt multiple dowsers as well).

And the doswer won't improve your chances by anything more than chance. Your choice of a reputable driller will be much more important in your success.

If you can't agree with any of the above; then it is a simple matter of contracting the drilling with the dowser who will with 100% certainty get exactly what he has you so firmly believing in.

DOWSERS WILL NOT IMPROVE THE OVERALL SUCCESS RATE of getting a "good" well. It's but a sad commentary on what faith can do.

But you'd be very wise to choose a driller familiar with local formations; drilling techniques and having thoroughly looked at all the data available. It's the driller who will confim your faith in that undeserving "dowser".

[ASRG]

Well like I said, you either believe it or you don't. You obviously don't....I obviously do.
That's okay. It's still supposedly a free world.

[oneoff]

Sometime just ask yourself what nonsense you are believing in.

And which side of a serious debate would you sooner be on ; if you were most interested in helping promote the spreading of useful information to enable the use of scarce resurces to provide water supplies for citizens who can't afford wasting those resources on your chosen nonsense.
With sufficient propaganda; and promotion of faith by a big enough system; just about anything can be sold to the masses. For instance; are you proud of the overall damage of lotteries; and a society that has bought into zero percent interest rates and getting all your desires with borrowed money. And now you would add that water well witchers are the people who we first turn to to determine our water supplies (and others woud say our oil supplies etc. etc).
Hardly not a mention of a list of other concerns that interfere with any other site that a reputable driller or consultant firm would consider.

Well I'll tell you that those narrow "streams" that a witcher "finds"; had better connect to aquifers some acres or sections or townships in size; or you will indeed have an undependable supply every mid January (in most cases).

[oneoff]

And drilled wells and boreholes can not be made perfectly plumb ......and while every water well driller suspects almost every well site has been chosen through the services of a "Water witch or paid dowser".... you may not know it; but there is a code amongst drillers that none of those specfic sites ever get a drill rig backed directly over that witches flag.

A driller can get away with ignoring the witches/owners directive on exact site through the following truths.

While a landowner may have tens of thousands of acres of acres that they own; a convenient location within a reasonable distance of a power supply; acesss to a non-freezing area for pressure systems; minimizing trenching costs; pressure drops; sufficiently away from sources of contamination; away from underground infrastructure; potential conduits of contamination; distancing from accidental sources of damage to the above ground portions of the well; future access to the well for servicing; away from damage to landscaping; away from potential damage to existing and future buildings; regulatory setbacks; overhead power line distance setback considerations; crossing existing underground infrastructure; levelness of site for rig setup; avoiding even worst case flooding of wellbore area and ponding of water around well bore; enough slope behind mud trough to avoid working in a "muck hole"; positioning rig so that drillers is not looking into the sun as much as possible and of course protection from cold winds and shade from hot summer sun for drilling operation; and so on........the truth is that its hard to find a suitable location let alone without being constrained by some false claim that you will miss water by a few inches.

I know one driller who always always set up any other suitable place except where that dowsers flag was positioned....and it made absolutely no difference.... Furthermore I would defy anyone to impune my training; experience or reputation on these matters.
Water witchers and their faith follwers do much more damage than they will ever know. And there are important reptable souces of information; verifiable data and mapping that should guide water souce investigations and actualdrilling.
Start by giving all aspects of water supplies the close scutiny that they deserve. For those who do not yet know it; your water supply is what largely determines whether your yard site will still be be use 50 years from now. And your water supply can be 30 or 100 years old and still be relied on everyday. And quite possibly at a cost over those decades for the one time cost of a single year's depreciation cost of a half ton truck.
Thats what you are putting in the "capable" hands of that dowswer who can't be duplicated. In fact; no mention yet as to who his replacement will be.

[grassfarmer]

I'm with ASRG on this one. I don't know how it works
but it does work for certain people. To dismiss it
because it doesn't fit what we accept as "sound
science" based on our knowledge today is nonsense.
Remember people used to thing the earth was flat?
that was obviously the sound science of the day.

Not on water witching per se but more on general
divining using a pendulum. There was a man in
Scotland who was a close friend of my grandfather
who had an uncanny ability to map things
underground using a pendulum. On my grandfathers
farm he was looking for something in a 10 acre field
when he started coming across what he said was
underground masonry of some type. He sketched all
the lines he found on a piece of paper and it was
subsequently excavated by archaeologists as the site
of a previously unknown Roman camp. I know this to
be true because I used to visit the site as a kid.
Can't recall the man's name but when I remember i'll
post it as there are numerous mentions of him on the
internet.

[oneoff]

Don't we all love good stories and anecdotes.

Don't know how it works; and neither does anyone else. No need to explain or thinks about what you're sayong either. After all there is such a thing asfaith; and saying that "it works" should not be challenged.

Well it doesn't work; at least not any more than the odds of any person throwing a dart.

No if you'd say that a keen observer had it figured out that sand beds along side valleys and lglacial drainage runs have springs asssociated with them; and might be a good place to explore for water sources; that would be one thing.
To blindfold those witches on level ground and have any of them agree on where the water is, would be quite worthless.

Members of society would be wise to place no faith in such rituals. I do hope none of the believers have any positions of importance in the representation of other people's business.
Its quite possible that a dowsers(or their believers) other irrational beliefs interfere with other sound business decisions; that also affect other persons pocketbooks and their personal lives.