Wellkept Education Hub
Own a private well? Learn to run it like a pro.
No city water department is watching your well. These guides teach you what to test, what to fix, and when — written for rural homeowners, homesteaders, and property managers.
Contamination & Testing
What's actually in your water, what the numbers mean, and how to fix a bad result.
Coliform Bacteria in Well Water: What a Positive Test Actually Means (and How to Fix It This Weekend)
A positive coliform test doesn't always mean sewage. Learn what total coliform vs. E. coli results mean, and the exact weekend fix — inspection, shock chlorination, and retesting.
Read the guide →How to Shock Chlorinate Your Well: Step-by-Step With Exact Bleach Amounts by Well Depth
The complete DIY shock chlorination guide: exact bleach amounts by well depth and casing diameter, a 10-step walkthrough, safety rules, and how to verify the water is safe again.
Read the guide →Nitrates in Well Water: Safe Levels, Who's Most at Risk, and the Only 2 Filters That Remove Them
Nitrates are invisible, tasteless, and dangerous to infants and pregnant women above 10 mg/L. Learn safe levels, why boiling makes it worse, and the only two treatments that work.
Read the guide →Arsenic in Well Water: The Tasteless, Odorless Contaminant Hiding in 1 in 10 Private Wells
Arsenic occurs naturally in bedrock and affects millions of private wells. Learn the 10 ppb limit, which regions are hotspots, and the treatments that actually remove it.
Read the guide →How Often Should You Test Well Water? The Complete Annual Testing Schedule (Free Printable)
The complete well water testing schedule: what to test every year, every 3 years, and after specific events — plus the triggers that mean test right now.
Read the guide →PFAS in Well Water: The Rules That Protect Cities Do Not Cover You
The EPA set enforceable PFAS limits for public water systems in 2024 — and private wells were excluded entirely. What that means for well owners, how to test, and the two filters that work.
Read the guide →Lead in Well Water Is Almost Never the Well — It Is Your Own Pipes
Lead rarely comes out of the aquifer. It dissolves out of your plumbing, driven by acidic water. Why the first-draw sample matters, the 15 ppb action level, and how to fix the cause instead of the symptom.
Read the guide →Black Stains and Bitter Water: Manganese in Well Water Is More Than Cosmetic
Manganese leaves black specks in laundry and slime in toilet tanks — and above 0.3 mg/L there is a health advisory, with infants the group of concern. Levels, treatment, and why it ruins UV systems.
Read the guide →Radon in Well Water: The Risk Comes Out of Your Shower, Not Your Glass
Radon in groundwater escapes into household air every time you shower or run the washing machine. Why the main exposure is inhalation, how testing differs from air testing, and why aeration beats carbon.
Read the guide →Uranium in Well Water: A Kidney Risk Before It Is a Radiation Risk
Natural uranium dissolves out of granite and sandstone into private wells. The 30 µg/L limit, why chemical toxicity to the kidneys matters more than radioactivity, and the treatments that work.
Read the guide →Fluoride in Well Water: Nobody Added It, and It Can Still Be Too High
Natural fluoride occurs in groundwater and can exceed the 4.0 mg/L federal limit with no one adding anything. Levels, what dental and skeletal fluorosis mean, and the treatments that remove it.
Read the guide →Copper in Well Water: Two Different Numbers, Two Different Problems
Copper has an aesthetic standard at 1.0 mg/L and a health action level at 1.3. It almost never comes from the aquifer — it comes from your pipes, driven by acidic water.
Read the guide →Methane in Well Water: A Gas Problem, Not a Drinking Problem
Water that fizzes, spits or bubbles. Methane is not toxic to drink, but it comes out of solution indoors and it is explosive. The 10 and 28 mg/L action levels, and why they are advisory.
Read the guide →Fuel, Solvents and VOCs in Well Water: When to Stop Drinking Immediately
A chemical or petrol smell from the tap is one of the few results that justifies stopping before the lab replies. What VOCs are, the limits that apply, and why showering matters as much as drinking.
Read the guide →Pesticides in Well Water: What to Test for if You Farm or Live Near Fields
Atrazine, alachlor, glyphosate and the rest. Which pesticides actually reach groundwater, the limits for each, the seasonal spike nobody tests for, and what removes them.
Read the guide →Pregnant and on a Private Well? Test These Four Things
Nitrate, lead, arsenic and bacteria carry specific risks during pregnancy and infancy. What to test, when, and the boiling mistake that makes the most dangerous one worse.
Read the guide →Hardware & Pump Maintenance
Pumps, pressure tanks, switches, filters, and UV — keep the system alive for less.
7 Signs Your Well Pump Is Failing (and What Each One Costs to Ignore)
Sputtering taps, short cycling, a spiking electric bill — the 7 warning signs of well pump failure, what each really means, and what ignoring it costs.
Read the guide →Well Pressure Tank Troubleshooting: Short Cycling, Waterlogging, and the 2-Minute Air Charge Check
Pump clicking on and off constantly? Your pressure tank is probably waterlogged. The 2-minute air charge check, the fix, and when the tank is truly dead.
Read the guide →How Often Should You Really Change a Whole House Sediment Filter? (Hint: Your Pressure Gauge Knows)
Forget the '3 months' rule of thumb. Your pressure gauges tell you exactly when to change a sediment filter — here's the 10–15 psi rule, plus how to pick the right micron rating.
Read the guide →How to Adjust Your Well Pressure Switch (40/60 vs 30/50, Explained Without an Electrician)
Boost weak water pressure safely: how a well pressure switch works, 30/50 vs 40/60, which nut to turn and how far, and the pressure-tank step everyone forgets.
Read the guide →Your UV Water Purifier Is Probably Lying to You: Why UV Bulbs Die at 12 Months Even If They Still Glow
A UV bulb that still glows can be barely disinfecting. Why UV lamps must be replaced every 12 months, what the quartz sleeve does, and the annual service that keeps water safe.
Read the guide →Everyday Water Quality & Aesthetics
Smells, stains, cloudiness, and hardness — diagnose the symptom, match the fix.
Why Your Well Water Smells Like Rotten Eggs (and the 3 Fixes, From $20 to $800)
That rotten egg smell in your well water is hydrogen sulfide. Learn the 5-minute test to find the source, and the exact fix for your situation — from $20.
Read the guide →Orange Stains in Your Toilet and Tub: How to Remove Iron From Well Water for Good
Orange-brown stains in toilets, tubs, and laundry mean iron in your well water. Learn the 3 types of iron, which filter fixes each, and how to remove existing stains.
Read the guide →The Homesteader's Guide to Water Softeners on Well Water: Sizing, Salt, and Skipping the Rental Trap
How to size a water softener for well water (the real formula), choose salt, avoid the rental trap, and handle the iron problem city-water guides ignore.
Read the guide →Blue-Green Stains on Your Fixtures? Your Well Water Is Eating Your Copper Pipes
Blue-green stains on sinks and tubs mean acidic well water is corroding your copper plumbing. How to confirm low pH, test for copper and lead, and fix it with a neutralizer.
Read the guide →Well Water Suddenly Cloudy or Full of Sediment? Here's What Changed Underground
Clear well water turned cloudy overnight? Decode what changed: air, sediment, or contamination. The glass test, the 6 causes, and when cloudiness means stop drinking.
Read the guide →Iron Bacteria: The Slime That Gets Blamed on Iron
Rusty slime in the toilet tank, a swampy smell, and filters that clog in weeks. Iron bacteria is a different problem from dissolved iron, and an iron filter will not fix it.
Read the guide →Tea-Coloured Well Water? That Is Probably Tannins, Not Iron
Yellow or brown water that stays clear, stains laundry and tastes faintly of earth. Tannins come from decaying vegetation, and neither a softener nor an iron filter removes them.
Read the guide →How Hard Is Your Water, Really? Reading the Hardness Number
Hardness has no health limit, two different units, and a classification scale most owners have never seen. What grains per gallon means, when softening is worth it, and when it is not.
Read the guide →Sulfate in Well Water: The Laxative Effect Nobody Warns Guests About
A bitter taste and digestive upset in visitors but not in you. The 250 mg/L standard, why tolerance builds, why it is not the same as rotten-egg smell, and what actually removes it.
Read the guide →Seasonal & Emergency Prep
Floods, freezes, outages, and dry spells — be ready before the tap sputters.
Flooded Wellhead? Do These 5 Things Before You Drink a Drop
If floodwater reached your wellhead, assume the water is contaminated. The 5-step recovery protocol: stop, inspect, disinfect, flush, and test before drinking.
Read the guide →How to Winterize Your Well and Pressure System Before the First Hard Freeze
Frozen well pipes can mean days without water and burst-line repairs. The complete fall winterization checklist: wellhead, pump house, pressure tank, and vacant-property draining.
Read the guide →No Power, No Water: The Well Owner's Guide to Surviving an Outage (and the Generator Math)
When the grid drops, your well stops. How much water your pressure tank really holds, the generator wattage math for well pumps, and the storage plan for outage week.
Read the guide →Is Your Well Running Dry? 6 Early Warning Signs Before the Tap Sputters
Wells rarely go dry overnight — they warn you for months. The 6 early signs of a dropping water level, how to measure it yourself, and your options before drilling.
Read the guide →Buying a House With a Well? The 12-Point Inspection Checklist Sellers Hope You Skip
A standard home inspection barely touches the well. The 12-point well inspection checklist for buyers: water testing, yield, equipment age, records, and the questions to ask.
Read the guide →E. coli in Your Well: Stop Drinking It Today, Then Work Out How It Got In
E. coli means fecal contamination is reaching your well right now. What to do in the first hour, why it is more serious than coliform, and how to find the pathway instead of just chlorinating it away.
Read the guide →Boiling Well Water: One Minute, Three at Altitude — and the One Case Where It Makes Things Worse
How to boil water properly, what it does and does not fix, and the critical exception: boiling concentrates nitrate, arsenic, lead and uranium rather than removing them.
Read the guide →Low-Yield Wells: How to Live Comfortably on 2 Gallons a Minute
A well that produces 2 gpm can still run a household — storage and pump control do the work the aquifer cannot. Yield versus demand, storage tank sizing, and what actually helps before drilling deeper.
Read the guide →Salty Well Water: Saltwater Intrusion, Road Salt, and the Softener You Blamed
Three very different causes of salty well water, how chloride and sodium results tell them apart, and why only one of them is fixed by adjusting your equipment.
Read the guide →Treatment & Systems
Which equipment your water actually needs, sized from your own numbers and plumbed in the right order.
What Order Do Water Treatment Systems Go In? The Sequence Nobody Explains
A softener in front of an iron filter fouls. A UV lamp behind hard water goes blind in months. The correct order for a whole-house treatment train, and what each stage protects.
Read the guide →How to Size a Water Softener for Well Water (With the Iron Correction Nobody Mentions)
The real sizing formula: grains per gallon times people times 75 gallons a day times 7 days — plus 5 grains for every mg/L of iron. Why undersizing kills softeners and oversizing wastes salt.
Read the guide →How to Read a Water Test Report Without a Chemistry Degree
mg/L, ppm, ppb, µg/L, NO₃ versus NO₃-N, MCL versus secondary standard, and what "non-detect" actually means. A plain-English guide to the numbers on your lab report.
Read the guide →Choosing a Water Testing Lab (and Why the Free One Is Not a Test)
Certified labs, mail-in kits, home strips and the free in-home analysis. What each one is actually good for, what to ask before paying, and how to collect a sample that means something.
Read the guide →Buying & Selling
The well side of a property transaction: due diligence, lender rules, and the paperwork that protects your price.
Selling a House With a Well: The Paperwork That Protects Your Price
Buyers discount what they cannot verify. What to test before listing, the documents to have ready, the lender rules your buyer must satisfy, and how to stop a well becoming a negotiation weapon.
Read the guide →Shared Well Agreements: The Document That Stops a Loan and Starts a Feud
If a well serves more than one home, FHA and VA require a recorded agreement. What it must cover, why a handshake fails at closing, and how to divide costs before anything breaks.
Read the guide →Well and Septic Distance Requirements: The Setbacks That Decide a Loan
FHA requires 100 feet from the drain field and 50 from the septic tank. What the figures are, why slope matters as much as distance, and what to do when a well is too close.
Read the guide →That Old Capped Pipe in the Field: Abandoned Wells and the Liability You Inherit
An unsealed abandoned well is a direct pipe from the surface into the aquifer you drink. Why the sealing obligation transfers with the property, how to find one, and what decommissioning involves.
Read the guide →Your well doesn't come with a service history.
Wellkept keeps your test results, treatments, and maintenance dates in one place — and reminds you before the next thing goes wrong.
Get Wellkept