Copperopolis, California top septic maintenance provider? Pump your septic tank. Most septic tanks need to be pumped every 3-5 years. The frequency depends on how many people are in your home. The more people living in your house, the more often you should pump your septic tank. Take care of your drain field. Make sure all water is diverted away from your soakage area. Additionally, only landscape your soakage area with grass. If you want to add plants, be sure to only pick ones with shallow root systems. Finally, never park a vehicle on top of your soakage area. Vehicles can put a strain on your soakage area and may lead to ruptured pipes.
For homes where the drainfield is located upslope from the septic tank, a pump tank is added to move effluent out of the septic tank and into the drainfield, otherwise, the effluent flows using gravity into a series of perforated pipes buried in the drainfield. Slowly, the effluent is released into the soil where harmful coliform bacteria, viruses, and nutrients are naturally removed, then it percolates through the soil, ultimately discharging to groundwater.
Think of it like this: You would not take a car; you are potentially going to purchase, to a mechanic for a pre-purchase inspection / evaluation and ask the mechanic to check it out but to not open the hood. This would defeat the purpose of the pre-purchase inspection with a restricting limitation of not being allowed to open the hood. Additionally most counties require a person or business conducting septic system inspections and evaluations to be certified through COWA and NAWT, (California Onsite Wastewater Association & National Association of Wastewater Transporters). Although COWA and NAWT teach Pumping is Mandatory and “Must be Done” prior to a system inspection/evaluation, this is generally not enforced. Read additional information on click site.
Your drain field is likely several hundred feet away from your home but it’s directly impacted by everything you put into your septic system and maintaining it is important. A few things to avoid: Don’t plant trees or other vegetation on top of or near the drain field. Trees and shrubs should not be within 100 feet of the field since roots are attracted to the moisture and can easily start growing inside the drains. Planting grass is desirable because it will help reinforce the soil and prevent erosion. Don’t drive cars or other vehicles on top of the drain field. Heavy machinery will compress the soil and lead to broken drain pipes.
Slower percolation rates due to poorly draining soil with clay, bedrock, high ground water, proximity to a creek, or other complications require larger leach fields. There are two methods of calculating the minimum absorption area for a leach field. Traditionally, you dig an eight foot deep test inspection hole in the area of the intended leach field to allow building inspector, or your local engineer, to physically examine the soil and determine its Long Term Acceptance Rate. Or you can have a local soil testing firm perform a percolation test to clock the speed of your soil’s capacity to absorb liquids.
Foothill Sanitary started in 2001. A family owned business with a strong work ethic and true integrity. Our desire is to help our customers with their septic and portable toilet needs. We take the time to educate our customers about their septic systems so that they understand its function and how to prolong its life span. Our portable toilets are cleaned and disinfected very well so that you always have a nice usable unit.
An Evaporative System is used when the soil cannot treat the waste water before it percolates to the water table. This occurs usually in rocky or sandy soils which drain to fast or where the soil absorption is very poor as you would find in heavy clay soils. An evaportanspiration (ET) bed treats the water by using evaportranspiration, which is the loss of water in the soil by both evaporation and transpiration from the plants growing there. The evaportranspiration bed is shallow and can be lined with a liner or unlined. A liner is required if the soil drains so fast the water can’t be treated before it hits the water table. In clay soils the ET can be unlined which also allows disposal through some absorption in the soil. These are often called evaportransition/absorption beds (ETA). See extra info at Foothill Sanitary.