What To Do With A Natural Spring On Your Property

Wondering what to do with a natural spring on your property? Want to know how to make a natural spring flow better? Learn from experts how to use fresh spring water for all your water needs.

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by AdobeStock/O.Farion

Wondering what to do with a natural spring on your property? Want to know how to make a natural spring flow better? Learn from experts how to use fresh spring water for all your water needs.

Cold, fresh spring water bubbling up out of the ground — for drinking, watering the garden, bathing, or supplying to livestock — this has to be one of the most romantic, beautiful, and archetypal images of rural life. Lucky is the country dweller who finds a vein of this “homesteader’s gold” on the property! And especially fortunate is the man or woman whose new found spring lies well above the house. Once capped and piped, that water will freely deliver itself to all the spigots in the home!

If you are fortunate enough to have a usable spring on your property, you’ll want to thank your Creator for your blessings and smile broadly at your prospects. Don’t be surprised, though, if your sense of appreciation (or smugness) begins to diminish when, eventually, you get round to thinking about just how to develop that spring. How, for instance, can you encase it to protect it from contaminants, yet not simultaneously lose it by obstructing its flow? Is it high enough above your house so you won’t need a pump, strong enough so you won’t need a reservoir? Will it dry up in the summer — or freeze up in the winter?

Capping a spring — the phrase sounds so simple, so easy. And most times, the task itself doesn’t have to be too complicated if you know what you’re doing. That’s where we at MOTHER EARTH NEWS come in. We’ve developed a few springs ourselves, talked to experienced local old- and new-timers, and digested everything we could read on the topic.

We’ll share it all with you here. By the end of this article, you’ll know as much about capping a spring as we do. Enough to do the job correctly the first time.

  • Updated on May 8, 2023
  • Originally Published on May 1, 1985
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