[hkinser]

Our house well went out, so we needed a new pump. To do that they had to pull the old pump out and open the well, and anytime they open the well they need to put chlorine in it. It is pool shock. I am wondering if anyone would know how long it will take for the chlorine to reach levels where I don't need to treat it anymore, and if the chlorine safe water conditioners work to neutralize the chlorine form in the pool shock. We have a farm, so some days we can go through a few thousand gallons when my father is spraying or when the cows drink a lot. Does anyone know anything about this?

 

[Midnighttide102]

I know when my city water I use to use was only treated with chlorine I use to keep it in a barrel and air stone within 24 hrs it was safe for my fish you should really trying putting some of your water into a bucket test it then run airstone in it over night and test it again to see where u are at it will at least give you a starting point of how your water is and if the concentration of chlorine is still very strong , I have a pool I use shock in it usually by day after I shock the pool the levels are back to normal but if I were you I'd really try some in a bucket and see what happens

 

[hkinser]

That sounds good, although I don't have any way to test it at the moment. The water is almost back to normal tasting, so I know the levels are much lower, but I don't want to go off taste. I have a feeling it is more toxic than I can tell by drinking it. Would I find a test kit at petco or some place like that? I don't live anywhere near a lfs that I want to support, the only one closer than 70 miles is very dirty and the fish I got from there were very poor quality. Petco is 75 miles away, as is two other decent to good lfs.

 

[Midnighttide102]

Yes Petco or Petsmart or even walmart should have a test kit if you just want to check for chlorine I'd say walmart for a pool test is your best bet

 

[Diana]

A pool test kit should tell you, and there are aquarium kits, too, of course. The dip stick kind are plenty accurate.

If you have to order a test kit I suspect the chlorine will be gone by the time it arrives. Especially if you have a few heavy use days.
Still, you would then have it for next time. Keep it sealed and cool and dry and it will stay good for a long time.

 

[jasonpatterson]

Your nose is actually remarkable sensitive to the odor of chlorine. If you're having trouble smelling it, it's almost gone. And yes, any additive to remove chlorine or chloramine from water will work for this purpose as well.

The simplest test would be to fill a plastic bottle about half full with your tap water, cap it, and place it in a sunny window for an hour or two to warm up and for the water to degas. Open it and smell the air above the water. If you can't smell chlorine, it's not in there in any appreciable amount.

I don't know how large your well is or what volume you're using on a daily basis, but when I shocked my well at my last house (small well, light use), it was clear within a week.

 

[Sunsetsearider]

Wouldn't prime or other water conditioner take care of it?

 

[Diana]

Yes, Prime or other dechlor would take care of it, but these are dosed based on how much chlorine is in the water.
A shock dose is a lot more than is normally added to municipal water systems.

I would hold off doing water changes until at least some heavy use (irrigation or filling water troughs) has removed a lot of the chlorine.

Another way to remove it is to put the water into as wide and shallow a container as you can, and run a fountain pump to circulate the water. Chlorine ought to be gone in 24 hours. This is sort of like jason's test, except you are allowing the chlorine to escape. This is also the way water was treated for aquariums before chloramine was added to the water.

 

[Linwood]

The pool test kits are not really accurate enough, as mentioned your nose is much better.

We lived for many years on a farm with water, so I did this several times as wells changed. "Shock" in this case refers more to the fact they used pool chlorine than that they necessarily added a really high level (though they might have). Pool chlorine is a couple times as concentrated as for household use (and often cheaper to buy it that way, by the way, if you use a lot!).

How dilute it becomes differs widely depending on the type of well, depth of water column, and how open the base is to the aquifer (e.g. is there any flow out into the aquifer). In other words, there's no good guidance you can follow for time other than "until it's gone". Our shallow well seemed to take several days, the deeper well's smell was gone by the next morning.

But most people's nose is fairly sensitive, if you take a shower and it doesn't smell a bit like a pool, you are likely golden. But PRIME (or similar) will take care of it regardless if in doubt, and for a couple weeks cannot hurt.

 

[hkinser]

Thanks for all the advice. The smell in the shower has been gone for a few days, we used over 3000 gallons on Thursday and likely several hundred the other days since then, so I think I am good. The well is over 200 ft deep, and they found water at 160 ft this time (no clue where the water is coming from, last time it was checked a year and a half ago it was 210 ft deep, it is very unusual for it to increase that much, especially with the drought) so I should be good. I have some aquasafe I can add, so I will try smaller water changes with the aquasafe and monitor for any unusual behavior. I don't have any containers to use that would be safe for fish, we have lots of containers on the farm from 5 to 55 gallons, but all of those have had chemicals or oil in them at some point so I won't use them for the aquarium water.