Welcome to our rural knowledge base
Table of Contents
As with this entire site, we are just beginning to piece the rural knowledge base together. If you are interested in moderating or building out one of these topics, please let us know! Get in on the ground floor!
Water:
Cannot live without it. Typically need potable and irrigation. Well water typically needs some treatment, for a certainty ponds, streams, and rivers will. Some properties have access to irrigation districts, try to secure a home or property below the irrigation water source, whether a district a stream a pond, etc., so gravity does the work for you. One foot of rise is 0.43 PSI.
Irrigation:
Does not need to be potable and often is NOT, especially when from an irrigation district (ID)
Drip Irrigation (Low Pressure)
- Optimum Range: 15–30 PSI
- Why: Drip systems use delicate tubing and emitters. Anything above 30 PSI often risks blowing out fittings or causing the emitters to malfunction. If your home water system is at a standard 50–60 PSI, you must use a pressure regulator to drop it down to this range.
Standard Sprinklers (Spray Heads)
- Optimum Range: 25–35 PSI
- Why: Spray heads are designed to produce a specific droplet size and spray pattern. If pressure is too low, they won’t cover the full radius. If it is too high (above 40 PSI), the water atomizes into a mist that evaporates before it hits the ground.
Rotary Sprinklers (Large Area)
- Optimum Range: 40–60 PSI
- Why: These systems need more force to drive the gear-driven rotors. They are designed to operate at higher pressures to achieve a long throwing distance.
KEY TAKEAWAY: If you can approach 60 PSI and use pressure reducers where necessary, you will be doing very well.
Well, if you have no water provider (yes, a play on words), you most likely have or need a well. There are a lot of things to consider.
Contamination:
Fertilizers, pesticides, spills
Pumps:
Submersible, above grade, VFD (Variable Frequency Drive), Soft start,
Testing:
Chemicals bacteria, odors, heavy metals
Filter(s):
Chemicals bacteria, odors, heavy metals
KEY TAKEAWAY: In the rurals, you are the water district. Never take your well for granted; regular production testing and annual water quality checks are the only way to catch a dropping water table or contamination before your taps run dry. This portion of the rural knowledge base may be the most important.
Wastewater
Septic Tank:
Typically two to three times the daily flow. The longer the solids can sit, the greater their settling and decomposing rates are.
Disbursement Pit(s):
Depending on your property’s soil, layout, and space, a disbursement pit generally serves one of two distinct purposes in a rural septic system:
1. The Deep Well (Traditional Seepage Pit)
This type is typically used when a property lacks the horizontal acreage for traditional long leach lines, but possesses deep, fast-draining soil. It is a deep, covered excavation—often lined with perforated concrete rings and wrapped in gravel. Instead of spreading wastewater out horizontally, it receives the liquid effluent from the septic tank and allows gravity to pull it vertically, seeping deep into the earth.
2. The Distribution Hub (Junction Pit)
In more complex setups, a disbursement pit acts as a solid central hub to route, cascade, and manage water flow to multiple leach lines or other pits. In this design, the pit itself sits slightly lower than the leach lines and utilizes pipes set at different heights to create a sequential flow:
- The Setup: The pit features one main influent pipe (bringing water in) and multiple effluent pipes (sending water out).
- The Staggered Flow: The effluent pipes are purposefully set at slightly different elevations. As the pit takes in water, the liquid reaches the lowest pipe first, feeding your primary leach line. If the water volume increases, it rises to the next lowest pipe to feed a second leach line. Finally, the highest effluent pipe can act as a delayed overflow, routing water into an entirely separate secondary disbursement pit with its own set of leach lines.
Key Takeaway: Whether you are relying on vertical seepage or using a pit to sequence water to your leach fields, always check your local codes (AHJ) before digging. Water tables and soil types dictate strict rules on how and where disbursement pits can be utilized to prevent groundwater contamination.
Leach Line
Livestock
Property Lines
“I can dig by hand…” Most acreage needs equipment to get work done quickly. Digging a trench to 24″ deep by 24″ wide by 250 feet long in dry, compacted, rock-impregnated earth is NOT an easy task by hand. We need your equipment expertise to build on this aspect of our knowledge base.
Backhoe:
Also called a combo or combination. It has an “excavator” on one end and a loader on the other. This is, perhaps, one of the most widely used pieces of equipment in the rurals.
Excavator:
An awesome piece of equipment. Anytime something is built for one thing, it typically has a few more features than something like a combination. In this case, it is often on tracks versus wheels and instead of having to turn around, you spin the whole thing on top of its tracks. They come in a lot of different sizes.
Loader:
Others:
Power
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