Our Water Sitch
Water is life. And, turns out, water is also death. To bugs anyway. Even the smallest amount of water dripping or spilled around our camp calls forth the forest bug community from all directions. If we leave the catch bucket from our hand washing station uncovered overnight, in the morning it will be chock full of dead moths. Butterflies, wasps, flys, and as assortment of other insects perish in there too. I even found a mouse drowned in the bucket on two separate occasions. Since the poor dead mice, we’re doing our very best to remember to cover the catch bucket when we turn in at night.
Here at EM, we don’t have water on site. We have the remnants of an old creek bed on our property - Keystone Creek - but from what we can tell, the creek hasn’t made it this far downhill in quite a while. Presumably, at one point, it would’ve emptied into the Clark Fork River, 2.5 miles down the road. Keystone Creek, while narrow and shallow, is still running just a short drive north of us up on the National Forest land, but Mike and our son Jaden did an expedition a couple weeks ago to locate what happens to it and they discovered the little creek just sort of runs out of steam and turns into a mud patch about one mile north of our property.
We also don’t have a potable water source. At some point we might look to put in a well, but it won’t be anytime soon. Not only is it super expensive to put in a well but it’s also a gamble. After talking with well companies and doing some research, one just sorta has to shake the dice and hope for the best when digging a well. There’s no way of knowing where to dig or how far down you’ll need to go to find water. You hire the well company, tell them where to start drilling (yeah, we have to tell THEM where to dig), and then hope you hit water before you break the bank. In this day and age of electronic this and smart that, apparently the technology to determine where to dig and how far down water exists is still in the “sounds like a good idea/good luck with that” stage. Mike researched well logs in our area (which is public record) and saw that 400-500 feet down was where folks found water. At the current going rate, if we had to drill down to 400-feet, a well would cost us $40,000. So, yeah, we reckon hauling water really isn’t so bad.
We haul what is said to be potable water from a nearby local National Forest campground a 10-min drive away but there is some sentiment in it so we haven’t trusted it for drinking. We use the NF campground water to fill our 50-gallon storage tank (which we use for our solar shower bag and hand/dish washing station) and we haul drinking/cooking water from Missoula. Right now our water set up is working swimmingly, but down the line we’ll probably get some larger storage tanks and pay to have a water truck come out and fill it.
We also have what might be the fanciest kiddie pool set up this side of the Mississippi. (Side note: I haven’t heard tale of a fancier one on the other side of the river but I’m trusting that one is out there somewhere.) Mike dug out a spot to inset the pool into the ground. I mean really, who has an in-ground kiddie pool?! Since it’s inset, we can sit around it on the outside and put out feet in it for a quick cool down when it’s super hot out. We found out pretty quick though that we have to keep it covered with a tarp when not in use, lest it become a sanctuary for every flying insect within a 2-mile radius.
Turns out I have more to report on the water front than I originally thought, so thanks for hanging in.
Okay. So, it’s been super-duper hot here in western Montana - and, ya know, EVERYWHERE else too, or so it seems from the news. We’ve been in the high 90’s to low 100’s every day for a long stretch now. Thankfully thankfully, we have a dope sandy beach swimming hole just a 5-minute drive away, located on the Clark Fork River. We go there most days between 2:00-3:00pm. It has been truly amazing to utilize the river for a good ole fashion cooling down. We both submerge wearing shorts and a shirt that we just leave on for the rest of the afternoon, so we can reap the benefits of our cool wet clothing for another hour or so after we swim. We’ve been rather amazed to find that not only does our river dipping give us a proper cooling down physically, but it rehydrates our overheated, wilting spirit as well. We feel as though we become new people after we take a swim! And the invigoration we get from the river continues for a long time after. It’s really been working quite marvelously.
Swimming hole on the Clark Fork River
Just a 5-min drive from EM!
Back to the bugs. Here’s the thing. They’re not my favorite thing. In fact, one might say they are my least favorite thing thus far about living in the woods. They’re not terrible. I’m not overly wigged out by them. And it could be way way worse. All-in-all I feel like I’m on relatively good terms with them, when it comes down to it (for instance, I have no hard feelings for whoever bit or stung me yesterday leaving a palm-sized swollen area on the back of my thigh that is still red and sore and itches right now as I’m typing). But they’re not great. And I wouldn’t be sad if they all, like, just sorta disappeared. Here’s the other thing. The bugs were here first. Also, bugs are a necessary part of the ecosystem and they aren’t likely to up and vanish anytime soon. They’re here to stay, is what I’m saying.
Just like us human-folk, bugs need water to survive. The poor little dudes are super parched here in the woods right now during this heat spell. So today (Friday Aug 19), I decided I wanted to pay respect to our local bug friends and be a good neighbor by setting up a small watering hole for them to make use of. A little spot just for them. I cut out a portion of a plastic drink bottle, placed a few neat rocks I toted home from the swimming hole in it, and filled it with water. So the bugs would have a better chance of not drowning, I also put a stick in it, so they could manage their way back out should they go for an unexpected swim trying to grab a drink (which is how many of them seem to perish).
Pics above: on the left is our watering hole set up for the bugs and on the right is our watering hole set up for the deer
A few days ago, Mike mentioned wanting to set up a watering hole for our local deer friends, which was no doubt the spark for my watering hole idea for the bugs. So today we also set that up. In the dry creek bed, Mike’s been digging out silt to use for various projects. We used the hole he created and inserted a folded up tarp. Then we added a little bit of water. So far the tarp is holding water just fine. If nothing else, I’m sure the bugs will enjoy having a second water source. But we’re hoping the deer that frequent the area will make use of it. So this is us, practicing in our own small way to be good caretakers of the land and its local inhabitants.
We have on hand at any given time, between 20-25 gallons of drinking water. We found that when living the van life before purchasing land, we went through about 7-gallons of water every 5 or 6 days. We’re using more now that we have a camp set up and all, but so far our simple set up and hauling system is working nicely, at least for now.
Oh, and one last thing on the water front. As mentioned in my last post, we are currently managing ice in coolers for food storage, which means every few days, I scoop out icy water from the cooler to make room for more ice and to stop everything from floating around. Then I add the melted ice water into our hand-washing station container. No drop off water gets wasted here at EM if we can help it!