Well, last weekend didn’t go so well. At least Saturday didn’t go so well. I had gotten a schedule change at work so I could have the day off. I had planned to go visit a friend of mine that I haven’t seen in a while. You know, backyard, beer and red meat. Well that all changed when I decided to do a little gardening that morning/afternoon.
The tomato plants were getting big enough to stake. When they get so big, I stake them to their cages because if I don’t, they will eventually pull the cages over. I use a t-bar and a hammer to do the staking. I only have 3 beefsteak tomato plants so this should have been a short job. Well, I got the first one staked up with no problem. While pounding the second stake/t-bar in to the ground, I hit something. It was about 10 inches down. There are 2 trees near the garden so I figured that they were roots. I figured wrong. Since I had made up my mind to drive through the root, I went and got my pole driver. This tool is used to drive metal fence posts. After three whacks with the pole driver, water started to bubble up around the t-bar. This is what I had so far. Click on the pics, they get bigger.
Then I started to smell it. It was sewage. I knew it couldn’t be mine because the garden is not in line with the pumping chamber and the mound. I went and got the neighbor for a second opinion. He said that sometimes sewage lines T off at the tank, branch out, then run to the mound/field. Well Shit! apparently that’s what mine does. So the fun starts.
I called the septic repair people… on a Saturday. He asked me what size pipe it was. I didn’t know. He asked if I could dig up around the pipe to see what size it was so he wouldn’t have to make a trip back to the shop. Time is money. So I gave that a shot. Can’t see the pipe. Too much muddy water filling up the hole I was digging. When he got here he had a pump that would pump solids. It would pump dirt as well as water. He cleared the hole in the ground and inspected the pipe. He had a piece of pipe on the truck. He replaced the busted section and was off to his next call. I filled the hole back in and weighed my options.
Before repair
After repair
Offending pipe
Well, after thinking about it for a while. I’m going to save 4 plants. The plants on the west side of the garden didn’t see any waste water. I’ve already pulled the rest out. Yesterday I hit the whole garden with a full bag of garden lime from TSC. If any of those 4 plants survive that, I’ll keep’em. I’ll hit it again with some more lime in a few weeks just to make sure. Now how fun was that.
Oh yea, the company I called was “Weiler Inc Plumbing-Heating-Ac” they did a fine job. Their phone number: (219) 462-5985.
terryf 
Leave a comment