The Walden Effect: Farming, simple living, permaculture, and invention.

Plump sump pump

Ridgid 1 horsepower pumpIf I had to choose one type of device that was the most labor saving for us on this farm it would have to be our collection of three submersible pumps.

We've had the Ridgid 1 horsepower sump pump for close to two years now and it's really living up to its name. Our first pump was only a 1/6 horsepower which was purchased for around 80 dollars, and it did a good job, but for a little over 200 the Ridgid puts you in a whole new class of water pumpage. We started out using it for garden irrigation and now have it doing duty in the hand dug well helping our drinking water make it to a set of filters inside.

I've got ours adapted to fit a typical water hose and each time I fiddle with it I'm reminded of the early days when we first got to the property here and there was no electricity. The baby apple trees needed to be watered by carrying 5 gallon buckets from the creek, which was not all that close by. It was a tough job, but a good memory. It's hard to describe just how great it feels to be a part of testing and building such an integral part of our infrastructure. I grew up always having running water just a faucet away and took it for granted every day. Now I get a rush of accomplishment whenever I hear the trickle and slush of water making its way to wherever I direct it.



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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.



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