Septic

I dug up the septic tanks for the bathroom.   When a lot of water is flushed down the drains in a short period of time the water goes down slowly.  With one person the septic system works fine but with two or more people the septic begins to drain slowly. The problem seemed familiar.  When Francis and Linda visited me a number of years ago a tree root had infiltrated a pipe via a joint causing the water to drain slowly.

The advantage this time is that I know where and how deep the septic tanks are located.  I got to work since rain and snow were forecast.  With the overnight low temperatures well below freezing the ground is frozen until afternoon.  It took two afternoons to complete my work on the septic system.

The septic system is an old fashioned gravity system.  As you can see the tanks are a few feet underground.

This time I couldn't find a "smoking gun" as to a reason for the slow drain. No tree root masses were in the tanks, pipe from the house or the drain field pipe.  I did find several good sized tree roots along the tanks on their north side. I got an axe and chopped them out.

The tanks could use cleaning and I cleaned them.  First by using a pump to empty the tanks.  That worked until the material got thicker and harder to pump.  While I stopped and cleared the hose several times when the pumping got tougher, my pump decided to up and quit one time when I plugged it back in.  So the rest of the job to clear the tanks was done via manual labor and buckets.  It is a good thing that I don't have a great sense of smell.  And that I have a pasture that could use some fertilizer.

I then borrowed a metal snake from the guy who hunts on the ranch.  I ran it into the pipes and found no clogs.

Now to wait until the tanks refill to see if the minor stuff I did resolved the problem.  Otherwise I will have to dig up the drain field pipe and see if tree roots have clogged it.