manure piles and ground water??

Sometimes you just gotta scratch your head.......
Local guy had a manure pile that was about a meter wider than is was allowed to be (can be as high as you can stack it, just the area counts) because he forgot to shove it together. Got a fine because it was dangerous to ground water.
Now, the pile is on an elevated area a few meters higher than the valley it's in.

Few hundred meters away at the edge of a field (crops) is a running stream and also a spring that constantly flows and keeps the whole corner soaked.

The farmers that use this valley spray liquid manure several times a year to include spraying the hat field that surrounds this manure pile.

Where's the difference???

Maybe I'm missing something.

Dave

Yep, I just don't get it sometimes. I worked 34 years for the state forests. We could not have piles of wood chips over a certain number of cubic yards (think it was only about 4)because it also might contaminate the ground water. Woodchips? In the forest? Where the heck do they think the chips came from anyway! Needless to say, we were never to concerned about the regulation. We often had piles in excess of a hundred yards, but that was always short term too. We were also not supposed to have brush piles more than some certain size.
These regulations were being made by people who worked in the city and had no concept of our rural world........ too bad.
Cal

Part of my job in Code Enforcement was handling well pollution problems from manure piles.First I learned that over 75 feet is not a safe distance between the two.Runoff from manure piled on ledge traveled 300 feet in gravel soil to a drilled well.Another well that was 100 feet from a manure pile got manure in it on level ground.Salt pollution from open salt piles got into several drilled wells while a spring and 2 dug wells were salt free.As for liquid manure being a problem it can get into wells downstream when spread when the ground is still frozen.The liquid portion evaporates quickly in hot weather.Plants do tie it up and keep from moving far.Liquid manure is a stupid idea.

i am not tryin to start a small war, but these laws were put in place because somewhere common sense had failed to prevail. i dont agree with some of the laws myself, even broke a few i am sure, but our ground water is the most precise resource we have (even more then gold, and oil)
and we should protect it the best we can, so one day our children can farm

Look up the Walkerton Water tragedy. My daughter has two girls in her class that were poisoned by e-coli.
One had to relearn how to talk and walk. She still moves with some uncertainty similar to a person with Parkinson's.
The other girl had her kidney's damaged and requires dialysis on occasion when they can't keep up.

All because some engineer with no practical knowledge or common sense drilled a well on low ground.
Also because the local "Old boys" network hired two clueless brothers with zero education, background or knowledge.
Stan and the boy's knew the clorinator was busted but never installed the new unit sitting in the corner for over nine months until people got sick.
Stan would also take the water sample from the shop sink instead of going out to each well. Usually becasue they were too lazy or drunk to drive.
When people did get sick Stan and the boys denied any problems. Finally installed the chlorinator, dialed the chlorine ski high and flushed the hydrants hoping they could avoid blame.
People drank contaminated water for days when they should have been boiling or drinking bottled water.

We had a state DOT facility here that stored salt on the ground for 20+ years. The groundwater got so polluted that 3 small lakes here got so salty that they were several times saltier than sea water - nothing would live in them. And a couple hundred homes had water so salty that nobody could use it. The state, after being sued, put in a water system for the homes. The homes and lakes were up to a couple of miles away.

I think everyone involved in the Walkerton tragedy were idiots. After that new rules were put in place all acrosss Canada, I believe. I also think they did find the two brothers guilty of several charges but don't think they got a very stiff sentence. They caused several deaths and other health issues because of their stupidity and complete lack of knowledge about water treatment. Sadly they were hired to be in charge of the water treatment plant. Who ever hired them is just as bad. Dave

Well said brother.

Been mean'n to ask you, speaking of this subject, do yall pull from the green river?

Hard to belive KY has such strick drink'n water laws but pencil whip'n numbers here can you a good bit of jail time for this reason.

Many of the laws on the books are straight up bureaucratic bs, but on the whole they do save many lives. Kinda like drive'n laws, some are bs but we all need to fallow them.

yes we pull from the green river when needed, but our main source water is a fresh spring located at the top of a knob. and as for ky water laws i dont think one person knows all of then, but we have are fair share of them, and they are costantly revised. for all you ky operaors out there remember july 1st you have to verify your cl2 monitors (like your hach cl 17s etc,..) to another seperate cl2 clorinator. example you cant use a cl 17 to verify another cl 17 etc..

Stan is still around. Last time I saw stan was last year working for a lighting company out of Stratford. He was installing stop lights in Goderich. Somebody is still looking out for the guy..People in this area still know and loath him because he never claimed responsibility or showed remorse. I wish he was force fed the water he let others drink, maybe 50 gallons.

I have to wonder how Stan keeps employment with municipalities? For a while after the Walkerton mess he was working for the city of London.
Steve706, I can't recall but assume you are located in south western Ontario?

You have to love to one that went into effect in Feb say'n a licenced operator has to be on site at all times. State says I have to go half a mile down the road to get a raw sample. State says I can't leave the lab. Which one to you fallow? As for the Cl17's I ain't gonna fuss about drive'n around and checking them once a week and do'n that paper work, up till a year ago we had to drive around and get samples every day. We still have two sites with out Cl17s.

I have not read it, but my boss is say'n some time this fall we are going to have to start do'n NH3 test every shift with our other daily test, and the Hach method (which we use not when we need to) has not been approved by the state yet.

Reason I asked about the Green River is I was wandering if yall had the Synedra outbreak 3 years ago that far down? I am at the last plant on the Green. Most of the poultry houses for 3 complexes are up stream from me. We had nasty wet and warm winter, then a real hard freeze in Feb. Before the ground thawed it warmed up to 34 degrees and we had a 4" rain. For some reason no one wanted to say out loud we got slammed with NH3 and the river chemistry went nuts. When every thing settled down we had a Synedra out break that stopped our filters up. We had to slow down to 1/2 cappacity and still used more water back washing than we pumped out. Every plant I know of along the Green fought it for over a month.

no it didnt make it this far up stream. as far as you leaving the plant as long as it is in reason you should be fine. (whos your alls insector?)d.o.w. was walking into too many empty running water plants. but that new law really puts some small systems in a hard spot (like city of greensburg for exmple. mayor had to cut back there crew by over 1/2. but they only had 3 liscenced opperators, now there workin even harder trying to hire a licened operator so those guys can take a day off)
as far as the hach method for testing nh3s i am sure it will be approved as we get closer to that coming into effect.
i guess you didnt make it to the hach traing in madisonville (there was only 4 in the class)
if you ever get a chance to attend 1 of those classes its money well spent. (and it will count for your continuieing education hrs)

Our classes have been cut out for the most part. Some bean counter in the city building found it cheaper for us to take online "CEU Plan" classes. If any one ever brings that idea up down there lobby again it.

I would say the deal with licensed folks be'n on site will but some small sysems in a bind. I know there is a county plant upstream from me that only has one guy with a treatment licence. They only run 8 to 10 hours a day durring the week, then on the weekend what ever distribution guy is on call goes in on Saturday and Sunday to fill things up.

We are in pretty good shape on that, all four of us have a card.

Email me if you get a chance, we can keep up the shop talk with out take'n up space on a tractor site.

Dave