In the Southern border of Michigan we’re all balancing precariously on the edge of Fall, waiting to plunge headfirst into the deep freeze of yet another Midwestern Winter. Which means this post is 98% untimely because soon, all of the water in this state will be frozen. And yet… I continue writing.

Water in all of its glorious (and more recently, stinky) forms has been the subject of a lot of our work and worry for the last couple of projects.

Let’s start with the stink, shall we?

The Country Smells Like Rotten Eggs

Here’s what I signed up for: A 900 square-foot house with a mildewy basement,very inconveniently placed well and leach field, and whose roof is made of 2×4′s, all of which will have to be replaced, along with 85% of the existing house when we add on. And that’s a handful, but still in the realm of things I can tolerate. Right up until MysteryMan turned on the faucet the other day, and along with previously-normal water came the smell of a thousand rotting eggs permeating the room.

This is the smell of Hell. I did not sign up for this.

The conversation shortly thereafter went something like this:

Me: Twenty-thousand.

MM: ???

Me: That’s the amount of money I’m willing to spend never to smell this again. Ever.

MM: …

Me: I will sell my car and our firstborn child to remove all traces of sulfur water from my life. Just so you know where this ranks in the scheme of things for me.

Sure, I’m hoping it costs significantly less than $20k, but I will sell this house if we can’t find a way to negate the sulfur smell, which oddly, didn’t exist 3 weeks ago. And you know, the internet isn’t exactly overflowing information on sulfur water and how you can get rid of it. Or at least not anything whose website doesn’t look like a page for an infomercial product.

(Who ever decided that putting things in ALL CAPS WITH LOTS OF EXCLAMATION POINTS!!! would make people more likely to buy your product or listen to anything you had to say?!!!!!)

Here’s what I can tell you. There are two different water issues that include the word “sulfur” and the best explanation of them is from this website, which contains no excessive caps or exclamation points.

Sulfates: Which  are a combination of sulfur and oxygen and are a part of naturally occurring minerals in some soil and rock formations that contain groundwater. The mineral dissolves over time and is released into groundwater. Sulfate minerals can cause scale buildup in water pipes similar to other minerals and– here’s something I bet you didn’t know– may be associated with a bitter taste in water that can have a laxative effect on humans and young livestock.

As if we don’t have enough going on without dealing with excessive pooping. Jesus.

Hydrogen Sulfide: Hydrogen sulfide gas also occurs naturally in some groundwater. It is formed from decomposing underground deposits of organic matter such as decaying plant material. Occasionally, a hot water heater is a source of hydrogen sulfide odor. The magnesium corrosion control rod present in many hot water heaters can chemically reduce naturally occurring sulfates to hydrogen sulfide.Hydrogen sulfide gas produces an offensive “rotten egg” or “sulfur water” odor and taste in the water. In some cases, the odor may be noticeable only when the water is initially turned on or when hot water is run.

This is likely our problem, and thank god it’s not the poop one.

The four schools of thought about treating water with a hydrogen sulfide problem:

1.) Pour Something Down Your Well- Reports vary as to whether or not this should be a couple of gallons of chlorine bleach or hydrogen peroxide. It’s called shocking and not for no reason. I’m not ruling it out, I’m just saying, really? 21st century and the best we have is “pour bleach down the well”? Regardless, here some pretty detailed articles on shocking your well:

• Shock Chlorination for Disinfecting Private Water Supply
• Well Shock Procedure (Has pictures and also ADS. ALL. OVER. Only slightly irritating.)

2.) Modify Your Water Heater- Replacing or removing the anode rod may get rid of the smell if you only have a problem with your hot water (which could be the case for us, please god). Articles on how not to pay a plumber $200 to do that for you:

• Popular Mechanics: Short article on how to replace a water heater anode- good discussion in the comments section as well.
• Really in-depth article on anodes, and replacement from Water Heater Rescue – Most important thing I read in this one “if you have odor and soften, consider getting a powered anode that replaces the sacrificial reaction with electric current.”

3.) Find an Alternate Source- My family, for example, dug a bigass pond in the back yard and all of the house water came from there. The fishy smell was only bad in the shower, but the algae that came out in the ice cubes was a little off-putting to guests. And I know earlier you guys were all, $20k?! You are SO high maintenance! But 10 years of dead-fish smell in the shower should be some excuse for wanting to spend the rest of my life wallowing in fancy water. Alternatively, if someone could find me a shower that takes those Culligan kegs that might be acceptable.

4.) Purification – Even if we pour 10 gallons of bleach down the well, stock up on bottled water, and replace our anode, I’m still adamant about getting a softener/filtration system at some point. Because we are having a washing machine and dishwasher, and spending a little money up front so they aren’t destroyed by hard water every 5 years, along with the toilets, sink fixtures, and shower heads, is well worth it. The only sulfur purification system that I’ve found from a somewhat reputable source is the sulfur-cleer whole-house system from, that’s right, Culligan. Also, there are some interesting and expensive (but nature friendly) whole house filtration system options at Pelican Water Technologies. But really I’m not sure either of these things isn’t a scam.

Imagine we’ll be trying a combination of these things over the next several months, or else putting Memorial up for sale, and I’ll let you know how they work out.

How Not to Grow a Miniature Garden (by having water close at hand)

File this topic under things-you-might-do-to-make-your-life-less-difficult-or-your-garden-grow-better.

We’re still working on making a livable space in the Station so that we can, well, live there at some point while we’re working on the house. That meant running new water lines maybe 50 feet from the house to the station, and I can tell you when I looked at MysteryMan operating this beast…

… and was all, “while you’re at it…” He wasn’t surprised. Because he knows me.

And here’s the thing. I’m not going to spend the next 50 years, stretching 100 feet of garden hose out to the garden and back every day. We probably didn’t do it as much as we should have last year because of the pain-in-the-ass factor, and hey, 3 foot corn, okay? You may call it laziness, I call it efficiency. Because I want my garden to grow with the flip of a switch, and I also want to have time to make crookedbrooms or whateverelse strikes my fancy.

The trencher is probably the winner of the contest for Piece of Equipment that Looks Badass, But is Seriously Boring to Operate. I was all excited to get my hands on this baby, then I watched MysteryMan stand there with the thing moving six-inches every five minutes and thought, actually? Not so much. So I went and burnt a knuckle on the heat gun instead.

He dug a pretty mean trench though. (See? I keep him around for more than his good looks.)

Here’s the resource part of this section. Project cost for this is:

• $300 $150 to rent the trencher for a day
• $100 for the frost-free spigot (we salvaged ours from somewhere or other though,so $0 for us)
• $100 for the water hose
• Total: $500 $350 for convenient water.

Edit: I estimated a bit high on the trencher, but someone straightened me out.

Now would we have done it if we hadn’t already needed the trencher for the Station? Maybe not. But that’s because I was picturing it to be a whole lot more expensive and pain in the ass. It costs like $10k to put in a sprinkler system, but this makes me think I can put one in for under $1500, with some good planning. (MysteryMan just read that and then shoved a pencil through his eyeball. Don’t worry darling, not yet. I have a donkey pen to build first. )

Something Else That Makes Watering Things Not Suck

The first thing that sucks is obviously dealing with hoses, especially any hose over 20 feet long. But really my very least favorite part of dealing with watering equipment  is screwing things on and off of the hose. Seriously? Nails on chalkboard for me.

Which is why I’m stocking up on these fine accessories.

I haven’t figured out why quick connect fittings haven’t become standard on hoses yet. Do people really have enough time to spend 10 minutes every time they want to change from the watering gun to the sprinkler– getting the threads unstuck, screwing the hose onto a different sprinkler, finding the connection isn’t tight enough so water sprays down your front, and going to find a pair of pliers to tighten the damn thing?

If you’re interested in these, check out Claberinc.com where they seem to have a good selection. I’m particularly interested in the 4-in-1. It’s almost like I could have 4 fixtures connected at a time and just turn them on and off with a switch. Hmmm….

(Also, if anyone has had bad experiences with the quick connect fittings on hoses, let me know. I understand water pressure can be an issue sometimes, but I’m not super worried about that.)

Edit: People have given some great advice about water filtration and quick connects in the comments.

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