Water Wells and Water Witches

[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.

[ASRG]

Well it's my pocket book and my personal life.....so I guess I'll just believe what I want. And no, what I believe in doesn't affect anyone else....I've never held a gun to anyones head and said "You have to believe what I say is true!"
And by the way the local licensed water well driller who has drilled most of the wells in the area actually recommended the local water witch!
I believe in the Christian faith as well....probably another irrational choice...no science or experts to support it?
As a side note: grassfarmer my water witch also used a pendulum....but I have seen a county worker map out a water line with bent rods.....every municipal and utility company has a few guys who can do this.

[oneoff]

First everyone has to concede that the world is flat

And dowsers have to concede that where there is a near 100% certainty of the possibly of multiple zones of differing and varying quantity and quality of water at multiple predictable depths. Some aquifers are identifiable continuous beds (that can and do vary somewhat in thickness, porosity and permeability.)

And not one soul on this earth could guaratee everthing that is going on more than three feet below surface.

Fat chance of those agreements.

In such a scenario; what does a witchers interpretation of the "stronger" stream add to a situation where any properly constructed well would be completely successful.

Look at the "Geological Survey of Canada " exhaustive inventory of every known water well in Sask and Manitoba from the early 1930's. These comprehensively cover the whole of settled Sask and Western Manitoba (maybe Alberta too; but I've not had the need to research that). Time after time in bedrock formations the summary for each township and range states that "throughout the township; an abundant suppy of whatever quality water can be expected to be obtained from a certain depth range"
Now where only glacial deposits are obtained you are likely to read statements cuch as "intermittent supplies of hard water are/ are not likely to be obtained from pockets of sand or gravel within the glacil drift." Thats where chance comes in for anyone advising to go "wildcatting" or testhole drilling. The chances of success for a driller; or a wannabe dowser who has the ability to run an actual real machine capable of trying to complete a well....... are identical (given the assumption that both are equally capable.) But how could any self respecting dowser admit that what might be expected from conventionally accepted knowledge is vastly superior to "hockus pokus BS)" and it matters diddly squat whether you stray 2 inches; 2 feet or 200 feet from any spot any man or animal might pick out.

The reason some areas have many "dryholes" while others are more likely to be somewhat more dependable are of course usually dependent on local recharge and suscepability to drought. You almost always find some sand or gravel (maybe lots); and if the water table is above the bottom of the pocket; or hopefully a much larger deposit; then you could produce some fluids. It may be undrinkable or unfit for any use. It may be capable of 30 gallon per minute pumping for 30 minutes or 30 years and hardly decline at all; and those are the issues that are of a lot more importance than anyone who claims they can find water.

I'll argue and win every time; that 5 gallons per minute (or less) of soft water (which typically is iron free) is preferable every time for domestic use and even a hundred head of livestock); compared to the choiceof a larger quantity of hard water that stains everything it touches with iron deposits and the stuff that grows and eventually plugs up everything it ever comes into contact with. Does your trusted witcher discuss that with their clients; or are you just impressed with his supposed abilities to "get water".
Drought just happens to coincide when users have just lost their usual water source from a dropping water level. Just skip the step of letting dowswers additionally screw up your already desperate situation.

[ASRG]

Maybe you should start a campaign to burn all those water witches at the stake?

[blackjack]

Well I don't usually get involved in these discussions...Jim witched for us here in our area with great success.

[oneoff]

Don't think I'm suprised. There are no limits set to how far blind faith and personal opinions can stray from laws; proven facts and unproven beliefs and faith that have absolutely no shred of a scientific basis.

There is however no public interest served in propagating testimonials which have not been peer reviewed; nor scrutinized for gross errors that you may have overlooked.

And it will be strictly a coincidence when two (and highly improbable with any greater number) of the charlotons accidentaly come to the same conclusions as to the convergence of "underground streams" or whatever energies they might claim to be tapping into.

And shame on all the audience to be so easily sucked into this propaganda. Use your time to research the data and the free information and consulting services which will help you locate the water which you may need. eg. Water Securiy Agency in Sask; available e-logs; Geological Survey Township data; on-line driller reports etc