Isabella knows what she is talking about. Has anyone experienced a problem with trees being too close to their municipal water service? It is essentially the same thing - a closed sealed pipe. The tree has no idea that there is water in the pipe and is not staying up at night trying to figure out how to destroy it. Septic systems are a completely different matter as they are made to leach into the soil. They are opened to the surrounding soil and a water source to whatever is around them. Trees don't search out water, their roots grow more vigorously where they get water and not so much where they don't. It follows that they continue to grow toward the water source. Older septic pipes are also vulnerable because they are fitted together rather than being solid since they run on gravity rather than pressure. Those fittings leak creating a water source and the root growth heads to the source and finally into the leaking joint. A sealed water pipe from a well or municipality is not going to attract root growth.

Like I said, muley, YMMV, Your mileage may vary. People have different experiences with different things. Up here, most dowsers are just neighbors helping others find water for no profit, down your way, apparently, they are charlatans and conmen taking suckers for mucho dinero. Up here, a lot of the physical space is not that well studied*, and so, in many cases, geologist and hydrologists are just making an educated guess based on what limited local knowledge they have. *we have a couple of large, fairly major inlets on the coast that have still, never been charted. They have the modern equilalent of "here, there be dragons" noted on the charts, "This inlet has neither been surveyed, nor charted. Prudent mariners will navigate by visual marks, soundings and other survey techniques as prudent and will be aware that reefs, rocks, shoals and other dangers may exist." -"I just had a thought, maybe "unsophisticated" but here it is. If a certain person has a "personal attraction to water", how would it manifest itself while that person was swimming in a pool? Or standing in the rain? Would it be advantageous or detrimental? Would he be wetter or maybe drier than a person without this power? Could this be how Moses parted the Red Sea? Inquiring minds want to know. Or maybe this is all silliness....nah." Who said it was a power. You seem to be projecting, all that man vs. nature biblical dominance stuff. I said it was an attraction to water, thats it, some people are attracted to trees, some mushrooms, some mountains, some reptiles, some, humans. How does it manifest, well, my sainted Mom, knew that if I went missing, to look to water. I sail, ocean and white water kayak, canoe, swim rapids with nothing more than flippers, a wet suit and a skim board, fish, snorkel, scuba dive, was happiest working for a company that made deep sea rescue gear and robotics, build boats and in general, am happiest it I am within 100 feet of water, be it creek, waterfall, river, ocean, lake, pond, swamp, spring or even just damp moss,..... Started compeditive swimming at age 8 and now, at over 65, can still swim 100 meters freestyle in under 1 minute. Can hold my breath for over 7 minutes underwater, have surfed, jumped waterfalls, basically, other than deep freediving have done almost all of it. Crossed the Atlantic twice in a sailboat and the Pacific once. Swum the rapids of the Chehalis in Feb, (steelheading, lost dog, long story),.... Middle of the ocean, nothing in sight, I'm as happy as a clam as I have water near. My plan was 45' sailboat and the world as my oyster, and yet, because of the love of my life, I live in a desert and try to farm. YMMV.

Sspye, My sister mentioned that a few weeks ago and I almost died laughing. I know the neighborhoods that are most likely to get chickens and they are all near the high schools. The kids are going to get into some trouble! There used to be a lot of farmers that would bring food to the old Farmer Johns stand in AA and loved walking to it as a kid. Things sure have changed!

We're doing...okay. :) The water heater should get here Thursday or Friday, and DH will get the laundry sink hooked up hot and cold. Once that happens life will get much, much easier. I've also ordered a 2nd portable induction hob which is also on the way. For plumbing, for now, I'm using the garden sprayer on our front porch for quick rinsing (the "don't let stuff dry and get crusty before I actually wash it" rinsing) and for actual dishwashing, we're using the bathtub in the main bathroom on the second floor. Hauling a big plastic tub with all the dishes up and down is...sub-optimal. (I'm snorting). As I sit and type my back is on freakin' FIRE. I wish, wish, wish we could do pizza or subs or whatever...but half our house is basically wheat, corn, and soy free...and I'm on a 3-mth protocol that doesn't allow for a bunch of other stuff that makes it extremely difficult to find anything "legal" that's not from scratch. It sucks under normal conditions. With the demo in full swing, it's making me tear my hair out. I'm hoping hoping hoping that we'll gain efficiencies as we go along and figure more stuff out. For example, I was prepping some ribs today for smoking (had to work from home with a sick kid) and realized I had a box of food prep gloves from a previous life that would be MUCH easier than washing my hands every 5 minutes while working with raw pork. AH HA! So the good news, by the end of this coming weekend, we should be as set up as we can get for the next two months. The bad news is that unless our reno is the extreme outlier that gets done earlier than scheduled (I'm snorting again) we're looking at 7 more weeks MINIMUM until our new kitchen is ready for prime-time. I keep thinking about how amazingly awesome it really will be, and how easy everything will seem with this behind us. It's just about time to pick some slabs and tile...2nd most fun thing ever after appliance shopping. :)