I called the septic guy yesterday, and he said he would be in the area and could come over this morning.

He came a lot earlier than I expected!

While he was here, I spent most of my time distracting kittens, but I couldn’t help but notice he was having issues.

He actually went rifling through the pile of poplars left over from when we cut them to build garden trellises with, 2 years ago, to find one long, straight and strong enough. Something was blocking the opening at the top of the tank, and he couldn’t get the hose into one of the compartments. You can see on the ground behind him, there is a heavy gauge metal wire. That’s his, and he’d tried using that, first.

He was able to get the hose through the opening and start pumping, thankfully! After he was done and packing up, I asked about it, and he said it was pipe. !!

I don’t know how this system looks beyond the very top, where there are openings to each compartment that he pumps through. I’ve tried looking up diagrams for dual compartment septic tanks, but they are all tanks that have two covers. Only one site I found mentioned some dual tanks might have only one, like ours. They also all have a gravity based outlet that would lead to a septic field or some sort of treatment system. Ours has an outlet leading into the pump in the basement, which pumps the effluent all the way out to near the barn, where it is expelled through an above-ground pipe. What I call our “septic field” is basically the area the greywater pours into, not a real septic field.

He didn’t seem particularly concerned about the block; more frustrated because it made his job harder, I think. Still, I’ve passed it on to my brother. Something like this, I have to rely on his knowledge and expertise. I hate to do it at the best of times, but right now, he’s out of the province for Thanksgiving with the grandbabies.

Everything seems to be working fine, though, so this was a bit of a surprise, that’s for sure!

My main concern is that someone is going to have to go down there to check it out. And if it’s something that needs repair, likely an excavator will need to be brought in. That’s a massive expense.

Hopefully, that will not be necessary!!

The Re-Farmer