We have a drilled well with sulphur water in it. Does anyone know why the sulphur smell is stronger after it rains? Just curious.

Russ

-- (imashortguy@hotmail.com), February 28, 2002

Answers

its not the rain but the barametric pressure that effects it. sulphur is just a gas. to have good drinking water just let it set out over night and then put it in the fridge to chill. No more sulphur.The sulphur beads up on the inside like carbonation. I just tap the sides every once in a while to hurry up the process but it is not necessary. I use clean milk jugs and I have a salt shaker lid that just fits the top to keep out insects but lets out the gas.

-- Corky Wolf (corkywolf@hotmail.net), February 28, 2002.

I worked at a stable where the water was sulpherous. We had to syphon the water from a heated cattle waterer into buckets. Talk about choke!!

We learned that when it came time to drink it from a glass - take a deep breath, pinch your nose, then drink, then breathe out through your mouth. The water tasted quite sweet, the rotten egg smell is all in the gas up your nose.

I'm not there now to test your technique so can you tell me - will my silver rings still turn all rainbow colours and black?

-- Deborah Hardy (virgil@igs.net), February 28, 2002.

Had sulpher water on our farm in western NYS. I hated it, it wa sawful, I couldn't stand the smell either and it did seem stronger after a rain or in spring thaw. We tried everything to make it tolerable, like filters, no dice, then refrigatoring, but still that didn't work. So we jsut got our drinking water from an old artisian well near Cherry Creek NY that had great water. it was this special place where folks drove miles to get good spring water.

-- Bernice (geminigoats@yahoo.com), February 28, 2002.

Probably has to do with the atmospheric pressure being lower after a rain, and that allows more of the gas containing the sulphur compound to escape. My Dad's well had a lot of the nasty smelling stuff. Only way to drink it was ice cold. We have some in our well here and use an activated charcoal filter to remove the odor.

-- Skip (pococj@aol.com), February 28, 2002.

Both the man who put in our well and the water softener man told us that our rotten egg smell came from bacterial growth and to bleach our well. The well man said to open the well head and pour in a gallon of plain old Chlorox bleach and close the well head. Then open all taps in the house until you could smell the bleach. Turn off the water and leave it for 24 hours (that's the hard part). Then after the time is up, run all taps to flush out the bleach and use as normal.

We are aware of a stronger smell in spring and fall and bleaching the well is one of our jobs for this weekend. I've often wondered if there were a healthier option like using grapefruit seed extract as a sanitizer. Any thoughts or experience there?

-- marilyn (rainbow@ktis.net), March 01, 2002.

Oh, Corky Wolf, THANK YOU! Just before Christmas we developed problems with our well and it now has sulphur and extra minerals leaking into it. I absolutely hated drinking the stuff, and have been going into town to get their water -- which didn't make me happy, either. So, after reading your posting about letting the water sit and letting the sulphur gas collect and dissipate, I tried it, and IT WORKS! I tap the sides of the container in the morning to let the little bubbles ome to the top and then the water is much better.

-- Marcia in MT (marciabundi@myexcel.com), March 03, 2002.