Dairy cows water supply

[Grassman247]

We’ve recently been drilling for water and drawn a complete blank so now are faced with using a mains water supply for the cows, we do have a ditch at the back of the buildings which feeds a pond which used to feed an old water mill on the next door property.

What have others done?

Is it possible to treat ditch water for cows to drink?

Or do we just bite the bullet and use the mains for watering the cows and ditch water for washing down

 

[Blue.]

I’m lucky I’ve x2 30” mains running through the farm,we we’re given a free supply as compensation,I don’t feel guilty as one has leaked in all the time we’ve been here (39 years) I’ve also a leak (last 12 months)that’s running more than I’ve used in maybe 5 years and the useless water company won’t mend because they have to shut the supply for half a day.

 

[pappuller]

We’ve recently been drilling for water and drawn a complete blank so now are faced with using a mains water supply for the cows, we do have a ditch at the back of the buildings which feeds a pond which used to feed an old water mill on the next door property.

What have others done?

Is it possible to treat ditch water for cows to drink?

Or do we just bite the bullet and use the mains for watering the cows and ditch water for washing down

Why have you drawn a blank ? Who have you used ?

 

[Grassman247]

Why have you drawn a blank ? Who have you used ?

Rob Piggott who used to work for wyatts of Whitchurch, to be fair to him he had a lot of historical maps of the area and we drilled the only place where there should of been running sand but we just hit clay

 

[pappuller]

Rob Piggott who used to work for wyatts of Whitchurch, to be fair to him he had a lot of historical maps of the area and we drilled the only place where there should of been running sand but we just hit clay

We used sonic drilling from over our end of the county, water drawn from sand at 19/24m not a massive flow but a big help. Seems to find water where others can't.

 

[Grassman247]

We used sonic drilling from over our end of the county, water drawn from sand at 19/24m not a massive flow but a big help. Seems to find water where others can't.

Might give them a shout cheers

 

[pappuller]

Might give them a shout cheers

Alan seems to be able to smell water, done all ed dale's

 

[Drago]

Done all sorts, spring fed reservoirs. Currently havery a papa pump fed from a stream.
How much water is flowing in ditch and where is it coming from?
I expect you require several m3 a day.

 

[alan6430]

We’ve just put in a system to pump water from the river because our mains couldn’t keep up with demand. Solar panel powered and all sorts. Then we have a UV filter. Wouldn’t use it for washing our parlour but fine for hosing the parlour out and drinking

 

[Grassman247]

Done all sorts, spring fed reservoirs. Currently havery a papa pump fed from a stream.
How much water is flowing in ditch and where is it coming from?
I expect you require several m3 a day.

Well the ditch was running all last summer in that heat wave, most of the surrounding area runs into it as it then feeds a mere

 

[Grassman247]

We’ve just put in a system to pump water from the river because our mains couldn’t keep up with demand. Solar panel powered and all sorts. Then we have a UV filter. Wouldn’t use it for washing our parlour but fine for hosing the parlour out and drinking

That sounds like the sort of thing we need, got a 50mm coming from the mains so that would sort washing the parlour out

 

[Grassman247]

We’ve just put in a system to pump water from the river because our mains couldn’t keep up with demand. Solar panel powered and all sorts. Then we have a UV filter. Wouldn’t use it for washing our parlour but fine for hosing the parlour out and drinking

That sounds like the sort of thing we need, got a 50mm coming from the mains so that would sort washing the parlour out

 

[Milkcow365]

Alan seems to be able to smell water, done all ed dale's

Think he did one near me that no one else could find water at as you say

 

[som farmer]

we used a diviner to find our water for a bore hole, thought it was a load of cobblers, but the hazel twisted round on its own, it was impossible to fake. any way we drilled where he said, we found 2 levels of water, at the depth he said, the 1st level, not enough, as he told us, carried on, and found the next level, with enough water, again, exactly where he said. his charge was £80, best money iv'e spent!
as an interesting aside, we had the archeologists, doing a survey, they found where the medieval villagers, had dug down to the first level, and made steps down !

 

[Grassman247]

we used a diviner to find our water for a bore hole, thought it was a load of cobblers, but the hazel twisted round on its own, it was impossible to fake. any way we drilled where he said, we found 2 levels of water, at the depth he said, the 1st level, not enough, as he told us, carried on, and found the next level, with enough water, again, exactly where he said. his charge was £80, best money iv'e spent!
as an interesting aside, we had the archeologists, doing a survey, they found where the medieval villagers, had dug down to the first level, and made steps down !

Problem I’ve got here is there is an aquifer further down but it’s full of brine and others in the area have tried to clean it and given up because there was just so much salt in it, I guess we need to find the right water

 

[Jamer]

We have resigned ourselves to writing the cheque out. Diviner yielded a 90m dry hole and drilling contractor was pretty pessimistic drilling on our heavy Severn clays. As pointed out by local geologist; you need depth for volume/re-charge rate but shallow for purity as the slow percolation through the clay loads water with impurities. Makes your water ppl stand out on a COP but sometimes you have to take the rough with the smooth I guess.

 

[Princess Pooper]

Can you at least get some rainwater harvesting in on sheds?

 

[Jamer]

Can you at least get some rainwater harvesting in on sheds?

We're trying to incorporate such schemes into a catchment grant. On 25-30" rainfall a year throwing capital into rainwater harvesting is a slow/dubious payback. Incorporating schemes as you go along makes more sense. As a certain Cheshire farmer named a few posts earlier, with multiple herds, confirmed at a producer group meeting a few years back.

 

[pappuller]

Think he did one near me that no one else could find water at as you say

Yep, he would have done dale's on the farm they bought up your way a year or two back

 

[pappuller]

Problem I’ve got here is there is an aquifer further down but it’s full of brine and others in the area have tried to clean it and given up because there was just so much salt in it, I guess we need to find the right water

Once you hit the mudstone round Cheshire the next step is brine