Well, it has been a busy week. I’ve been trying to get the space for the garden ready for planting. It is difficult work since the space hasn’t been used for years and the grass, weeds, and tree roots have made significant in-roads. Still, the soil isn’t as bad as I’d feared. But I’ll post about that later.
Today’s project was to work on the spring pump. I have been worrying more and more about how I was going to keep the garden watered. It turns out Summers here are mostly dry, just like in California. There is a hose connection near the water tanks (just above the garden area) but I have to conserve my water supply. Currently, it costs $65 to fill the water tank. If I stretch the water supply out so I only refill the tank once a month, I get precious few showers out of that tank! How was I going to keep my garden growing?
The solution was to figure out and repair the spring box and pump. I’d have to pay more for electricity when it is working, but it will provide me with a more-or-less continuous water supply and it should still cost much less than $65 a month, even with many more showers!
You might remember this blurry, dark picture (from early February) of the pump house and tank next to it. I have walked around this installation several times but have never been able to figure it out… until now. You see, the idea of a spring pump is to collect water near the spring behind a brick wall and then pump that water up to a tank somewhere. Ok, here was a little house with a pump inside and a tank next to it, but the tank was downstream from the pump, not above it, near the spring and it was not made of brick. There was no brick wall in sight. In fact, why was there a plastic water tank here, when the water should be pumped up to the main tank far uphill?
Today I finally found the cinder block spring water collection tank that collects the water further up stream… and it was a mess! When I finally cleared all the gravel and mud off the plywood top, this is what I saw. The small piece of plywood was left there to cover the monster I found when I opened the box the first time… until I could get back with my camera.
This guy was living the easy life in the this old spring tank! He was fat and sassy from the crickets that had also made a home there. Sorry for yet another blurry picture, but my camera is strictly autofocus, so I never know what it will focus on (anything in the foreground can leave the object of interest blurry in the background). This was the best of about 7 pictures I took. This is also the biggest lizard I have found so far, so I decided to name him “Son of Godzilla.” He was a nasty looking brute and I had no idea whether he would bite (or would be poisonous) so I prodded him out with a twig to another home in the stream bank. I still haven’t identified his species but he was impressive
Anyway, after a couple hours I managed to clear out the old spring collection tank. It is clear down to the clay layer below the cinder blocks but still not filling up much, which is fine for now. I think I may have to clear all the dirt and gravel from behind it as well.
You can see here where the water is backing up behind it. It is supposed to seep down behind it and through cracks between the cinder blocks near the bottom. I cleared out some of the dirt and gravel from behind it but not all. Right now the water is flowing down to the right of the box, around the outside, and only a little is flowing in through the cracks at the bottom. In fact, the whole thing is supposed to be full of gravel to help filter the water and protect the outflow pipe, just not gravel and muddy clay, which clogs the pipe leading out. I will probably have to get some advice on what to do next. At the very least it will require some screens over the outflow pipe, new gravel, and I will probably have to dig out the area behind it and clear those cracks at the bottom to allow water in.
So, how does the whole system work? The water flows by gravity from the cinder block collection tank down to the plastic holding tank. When that fills up, a sensor inside turns on the pump in the pump house and that pumps the water up to the main tank far above, near the garden and the main house. I still need to refill the cinder block tank with gravel and maybe sand, add some screens, etc., and clear out the area behind it. Then I need to get the water flowing down to that plastic collection tank. Finally, I will see if the pump still works. The plastic housing around the pump is cracked. I think the pump house has settled over time, putting stress on the pipe between the plastic collection tank and the pump itself. Hopefully that hasn’t broken any seals and the pump will still work, but it will be a little while before I find out.
It was a good day’s work. I got more ground turned over in the garden in the morning and made a good start on figuring out the spring pump system this afternoon. Once I get this part of it figured out I will clean out the reservoir tank next to the pump (which has a thick layer of mud at the bottom) and then it will be time to see if the pump still works. I repaired the wiring to it way back in January, but it has been sitting idle with the circuit breakers off for ages (as well as the other problems I mentioned) so I am hoping for some good luck there.
Tomorrow I may go buy some seeds and start the garden (choosing to be optimistic about the water supply). Mari sent me some “seed money” so I can get going with it. I’ll be doing some web page work for her in return. There is still a lot of work to do on the garden itself, but I can start planting the first section while I keep expanding it. Keep an eye out for another post soon about the garden with pictures showing my progress. 
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