My father 3was chief inspector for his area of sanitation department for 20 years. They had a pamphlet produced for campers. Here’s what it said.
You can use water from almost anywhere, lakes, ponds, artesian wells or whatever, add 2 drops chlorine bleach per gallon, let it sit overnight and if it still has a slight bleach smell in the morning it’s safe to drink.
Go with 8 drops if you want to, as long as you can still detect a bleach smell the next morning. If not, do it again.
I used this with wat3er from a local artesian well for over 10 years, never had any problems. Our well water was pretty bad, I think the pickup was too low and it was bringing up mud from the well. Water was brownish, didn’t taste good so we used water from the artesian well.
we have a different shallow water well now, better water but I still use bottled water for drinking. When I moved back here, artesian well seems to have some sort of powdery yellow fungus or something growing in the pipe, I haven’t been able to get a brush to clean it out with and see if it improves. Someone put a PVC pipe in at least 20 years ago. I got a bottle full and could see yellow stuff floating in it. Not drinking that...
Pour a gallon of bleach down the well itself and see if that helps. Or do the same to the holding tank. Let it sit for a day and then flush it out by turning on every faucet in the house and outside if off that’s off the same system. That should clean out the pipes to the house. Treat the holding tank a second time if you’re still worried. I’ve been told to do this once a year but never do.
Thanks. It amazes me that so little bleach will do the job. I’m sure it’s true though because I’ve heard the same recommendations from numerous reliable sources.