The elm is going to be stump ground here in another month or so. So bye bye to that!

Apologies for some of my typing errors, I have been trying to go back and proofread, but my key board is on strike and some of the letters are not working, the 'a' works sometimes but 'd' doesn't work at all and I have to copy and paste it over and over!

Heh, replacement keyboards are cheaper than blood pressure medicine. I just got a shiny new wireless keyboard and mouse for $20 at Amazon.

@RickCorey The cat makes that picture!

Helpful advice, ya'all! Fascinating!

I bought a new one yesterday at Walmart for $10

>> I didn't think you could put weed barrier or plastic down over the leach field because wouldn't it keep the moisture from drying out properly from the leach lines?

You might be right. I always just assumed that a leach field worked by letting the water drain away and down, but maybe some moves upward and then evaporates.

And now that I think about it, too large an area covered with plastic would slow or stop the movement of air (oxygen) down into the soil of the leach field. Surely that is where it is MOST important to allow aerobic soil life to flourish.

So plastic is probably a terrible idea.

I just remember SOMEONE warning about roots (even from vegetables) being bad for septic systems. And yet, many crops' roots stay shallow as long as they are getting everything the plants need.

So I don't know.


>> my key board is on strike

I wear out the lettering on my keyboard keys pretty fast, since I hammer hard when I type. So I found the cheapest possible source of spare keyboards: Goodwill. You can buy several for the price of one new one, and most of them are likely to work.

Julie said:
>> The cat makes that picture!

Thank you! Mr. Toby will be very happy to hear that. he pretneds to be above and beyond mere human opinions, but really he loves attention.

I think he was inspecting my work.

This PDF from U. Nevada Cooperative extension urges AGAINST vegetable gardens over leach fileds, due to risk of pathogens (especially with roots crops) and housdehold chemicals. Not even rasied beds: they confirmed what you said about the water needimng to evaporate upwrds as well as draining down.

http://www.unce.unr.edu/public...

"Construction of irrigated, raised beds is also discouraged, as these add soil depth and may interfere with normal transpiration from the soil."

- - - -
Here's a slightly different opinion from North Carolina Cooperative Extension. He says "If at all possible, I would garden somewhere else. ". But then he gives some qualifications in case that's the only place in your yard that you can garden - like "avoid root and leafy crops".

http://www4.ncsu.edu/~djgofort...

He also makes this two-edged point. I think both parts are valid, so it's like Topkien's advice "Do not go to the Elves for advice, for they will say both Yes and No."

"While human waste has been used as fertilizer for 1000's of years, it carries more risk than I think is necessary."

- - - -
Here's a compilation of opinions from a GW thread:

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/f...

>> My guy was able to show me exactly where the lines and the field were with a probe he stuck into the ground (when he hit gravel or a line, it clunked). If you can get the parameters of the actual lines, you may find that you've got some areas in the southern exposure that do not interfere with the lines.

>> don't see that annual seasonal crop roots can cause any long term issues as they are seasonal plants and once expended their roots will rot away.

>> know people who pump out of their tank to gardens smell a bit but they are still very much alive and walking around.

I would be concerned about chemicals from the septic being in the soil. the question is then do those chemicals end up in the vegetables? I would say yes, because studies have shown that vegetables sprayed with chemicals (insecticides, fungicides ect) do test positive for that. However that is from spraying directly on the fruit itself if I understand correctly. For example I have read that strawberries are especially contaminated with pesticides because they are so soft and have no real peeling. So the chemicals are easily soaked into the fruit itself through it's skin so to speak. I would assume that just as plants can take in chemical fertilizers through the soil, that they could also take in chemicals through the soil via their roots. So the only way to avoid that is to use natural products in your home, not to put anything down the drain that isn't safe. With that said, as was mentioned, water does not always go down as gravity would dictate. Water will actually go UP in the right circumstances. Pour a tablespoon of water on a plate and then hold a paper towel over the TOP of the water. The towel will wick the water UP. Same is going on in a leach field. The lines are 18inches deep (that is code for my area), I would say that most of the water does filter down. Especially if you are watering the top of the soil -as in gardening- it would already be moist. The trick is, as with any garden, do not saturate the soil, that is wasting water anyway. But if the soil OVER the leach field is dry, it will wick or soak UP the water from the leach. This is why the area over the septic tank is greener. I am not sure that it is entirely because it has "fertilizer" in it. After all the water coming out through the leach field is already filtered a good deal before it reaches the surface and even though it is gross to think about, it probably wouldn't make you nearly as sick as some people assume it is practically poison.
So the real question is whether there are any viable studies to show that pathogens (bacteria, virus or parasites, ect) can be taken up through a plants roots and end up in a tomato. Now, that is a different question than asking if pathogens can end up in a potato, which obviously has direct contact with the soil itself. I think it impossible for a bacteria to be taken in by roots, travel through the plant and implant itself in a fruit/veg and live or reproduce. I think that is just ridiculous, but I would love to read any studies on it if anyone knows of any out there. So basically, don't put chemicals down your drain, don't over water your garden or use plastic mulch films. I have read horror reports of vegetables growing 2 ft long roots, but I mean, really?! I would love to see that. I think that is pretty unusual, and even at that, we are talking fragile roots, not woody shrubs or trees or anything invasive.
I would think with so many people having smaller and smaller yards and gardening becoming more and more popular, that more studies would be done on this. And then find a way to fix this. I mean if you think about it a very large amount of water is going down everyone's drains day after day. As the saying goes, we can put a man on the moon--- can't we find a way to reuse our water and be more efficient with our space?

>> I would assume that just as plants can take in chemical fertilizers through the soil, that they could also take in chemicals through the soil via their roots.

I agree. Further, whatever anyone flushed or poured into a sink or tub wound up in the soil, where some chemicals could linger for years and only break down or leach out slowly. So that you might wind up eating the previous owners' chemicals.

I also worry about taking over someone else's garden. If someone was gardening in that spot before 1950 or 1960, they probably used insecticides including DDT and arsenic.

>> I think it impossible for a bacteria to be taken in by roots, travel through the plant and implant itself in a fruit/veg and live or reproduce. I think that is just ridiculous, but I would love to read any studies on it

Me too - it seems unlikely and I would like to know if anyone has tested it. Or rather, I wonder if anyone has tested it with an open mind!

However, some of what I've read speculates about soil splashing up onto leaves which then might not be cleaned the way a surgeon does, scrubbing hard for several minutes. Water and bacteria certainly could be wicked upwards as water evaporates from the surface, if the soil is not so sandy that flow is always downwards.

I also agree with your last paragraph: most of us live in small yards, many of which have large leach fields. (I happen to have a city-sewer connection where I live now.) If we are to garden at all, it would be nice to know how to do that safely.

Maybe part of the problem is that it would be a difficult study to do well. If a family of 6 is using a septic system design for two, on clay soil with lots of rain, soemtimes the water level in their their yard is ... in their yard. Or ankle deep. They are going to have visible problems if the garden anywhere near their leach field. But that just proves "don't be really stupid". Also, don't garden anywhere near or downslope from that family! And hope that zoning laws force them to fix the problem before your neighborhood has a cholera epidemic.

How about the family of two growing lettuce over their leach field with sandy soil, designed for a BIG family, with only enough rain to assure the leach water is mostly leaching downwards?

Compare them to a family that never gardens, or gardens far from any leach field, or has city sewers.

How often they have GI bugs or bloody stools may depend as much on what restaurants they go to or what supermarket produce sections they patronize, as to any "leach field gardening" they do.

Lettuce-pickers pooping in the fields and restaurant workers not washing hands carefully might make it difficult to prove whether "leach field gardening" in marginal circumstances causes one pathogen exposure per week or one per century.

Or maybe frequent low-level exposure keeps our immune systems active and protects us from greasy spoon restaurants and supermarket lettuce E. coli.

I just don't know. But it sounds like we should beware clay soil, heavy rains, root crops, and soil splashed on leafy crops. Given all those, a well-draining leach field MIGHT be such a low risk of pathogenic bacteria that it's hard to distinguish from the "dangers" of restaurants and supermarkets, door handles and public toilet seats.

Here's a couple from the elves:

http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/...
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pu...

and a few more in here:
www.ugacfs.org/producesafety/.../Internalization_pathogens_roots.docx

Great links, but I couldn't get to that last link.

>> Shiga-toxigenic Escherichia coli (STEC) O157:H7 uses a myriad of surface adhesive appendages including pili, flagella, and the type 3 secretion system (T3SS) to adhere to and inflict damage to the human gut mucosa. ... We found that STEC O157:H7 colonizes baby spinach leaves through the coordinated production of curli, the E. coli common pilus, hemorrhagic coli type 4 pilus, flagella, and T3SS.

It sounds like our gut flora really know how to hold on and won't let go.

Hmm. Right at this moment, I'm wondering if I could live on a diet of refined cane sugar and distilled water.

But I'll get over it.

The first two links support the idea that leafy plants would get most of their leach field contamination from splashing soil.

sorry,
I cannot seem to copy the actual link into here for some reason, but
I tried pasting the one above into google and it brings up the link that wont paste
opens as a word doc of citations and brief abstracts for me

oh no it didn't--
Well too bad
it is called
Internalization of pathogens through roots or seeds
Erickson
Center for Food Safety, Georgia

has a lot of studies conducted with other pathogens besides E. coli

Whatever!
Inserting this:

Internalization of pathogens through roots or seeds

into google brings it--and of course a whole lot more--right up

Oh, wow, I will google and see what I can find to look into. Thanks for the info.

Yes, on splashing leafy greens with contaminated soil. I am thinking that washing your vegetables is a good idea to make you feel better, but the truth is many of those kind of bacteria can live in pretty harsh conditions and merely washing produce in some water and patting it dry will not kill anything serious. Bleach or boiling/freezing temps are the only things that will kill some bacterias... I would think putting down a layer of adequate mulch would significantly reduce soil splashing onto leafy greens though.

Thanks for the Google tip, dirtdorphins! My boss would shoot me if I tried to read any of that right now.BTW, I just found this about "inoculating" with MR:

http://www.mycorrhizae.com/wp-...

P.S.
I like your screen name.

oh, wow that is a lot reading, don't have time now but will do it. I did see an option at the top of my screen enlarge the font/print size, because it was pretty teeeeny.

Hey @Frillylily,
I don't claim to know everything or understand whatever you have got going on there--
but...
at the farm, I had a septic tank and a drain field that went who knows where and mature trees everywhere. The system failed, badly. New tank and new system installed to pump out to a long, narrow mound for drainage about 300 feet away from the tank and way on the other side of the edible garden along a grove of trees on the down-hill edge of the property. The mound discharge worked well --above the tree roots--and the trees drank up everything that didn't evaporate. The biggest problem was keeping saplings out of the mound, but I grew all sorts of shallow rooted flowering stuff on it. (It has since been converted back to grass so that it can be mowed periodically because there is no one to 'weed' the volunteer trees)

Soil testing revealed that the main problem I had was with organic and inorganic toxins rather than pathogenic bacteria.
Besides the septic failure, probably a result of the fact that it was customary in that area to bury garbage and all manner of junk or just pile it up randomly and leave it everywhere and as Rick said, much of that stuff lingers on and on...
Plants are much more capable of incorporating organic and inorganic toxins than bacteria anyway, so that was my primary concern with the edible plants and location of the edible garden.

No doubt it would be expensive to convert your septic system to one that recycles treated water or one that drains differently, but it could be that with limited space in which to garden, conversion might be one of the most worthwhile investments long term. Something to consider anyway, but first you probably ought to figure out how and where it drains and what issues, if any, you have as a result.

The vertical axis is still very much an option, regardless. (I grew veggies and herbs in a discarded bathtub when I lived in a trailer)
Personally, I don't think a few raised beds over some areas of the potential drain field would compromise the drainage ... but, then again, I don't know how your place drains???

I hadn't thought of changing out to a different septic system all together. In the future if that comes up I will definitely look into doing something like that. For now though, money is a serious concern, or rather lack of it So as long as I can keep my current system going, I have to. My dh would never agree to spending money to update the septic just so I could grow a garden. He lacks my enthusiasm I'm afraid. He would be content to spend hours and hours mowing grass. I am going to try to locate the lines when the weather agrees, and also I think I will call the guy that inspected my tank last summer when we bought it and see what he thinks about the whole thing.

We had to have new lines put in here about three years after we moved in. There is basically only one company in this area that does this type of work. They came out to the house, and had maps of where the septic tank was and where the lines had been installed (twice before ). So if you contact the company who installed the system they my be able to tell you exactly where your lines run and where you tank is.

Come to think of it, whoever put in the system probably had to get a permit, unless it was done very long ago. Planning department might be able to help.