Back up water source

Traveling into remote areas I always carry enough water to cover myself but sometimes things happen and the supply gets down too low,
I wouldn't be too keen drinking from a dam ,creek or sheep trough and have been lucky so far as not having too.
As a back up I purchesed the Katadyn pocket filter and thought this may be of interest to some of you guys .
I wouldn't try to buy in Aust, as in camping stores they are around $600 but on Ebay from the US will cost you under $300 delivered.
Swiss made and used by the US forces and is a good product.
Mark
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/3445745/katadyn_pocket/

That filter could come in handy Mark.

I am only a novice in outback, however the people i detect with have built up a knowlege of the best waterholes and wells over the years and carry a rope and bucket for bailing out of deep wells.

The main thing is to keep your fresh drinking water supply up and you can scrounge cooking and shower water from wells and waterholes. My friends carry heaps of extra water storage under their vehicles and fill every bottle and jerrycan when water is available. Its good to have the luxury of an occassional shower and swim in a hidden waterhole. We won't start on the record of how long some WA prospectors have gone without a good wash/shower.

You can never have enough water, its usually the thing that you have to break your detecting spell for and go on a trip to resupply.

Tributer

not as professional as Marks one, but in a pinch two or three coffee filters stacked together work as a makeshift filter to strain out muck, mud and turtle turds from creek or dam water. Still always boil it.

G'day Fellow Prospectors;

We all know that each states water tastes a little different to every other state.Marks Swiss water filtering system is a little beauty[quality item].But if you cannot afford or simply put,do not wish to dish out $300 odd bucks or so and you need to draw water,for the purpose of drinking,whether it be from a creek,river,dam.bore or water hole,there are a few precautions that one can take,to guaranty ones safety,from a stomach bug virus. Always boil your water for 5 minutes before drinking,or use water decontamination or purification tablets, [according to the amount of litres].Or if you have to drink water from a creek,stream or river,always drink from a section that is continuously running and not from a still pool or rock hole.Now,if you can't stomach the taste of the water[pending on where it was drawn from],after it is made safe to drink, add a little of your favorite cordial concentrate,not too sweet,but just enough to kill the taste and the rest is history.


Cheers kon61

Gday


Carrying water purification tablets or filters is a good idea for use in a pinch, but you have to be sure that you always take more water than you need, use good clean containers so that all the water you have is drinkable, dont waste storage space on containers of iffy water unless you have a means of cleaning it if you have to drink it, you can clean out all your containers by filling them and dropping some Miltons tablets in into them ( the ones that you use to sterilise baby bottles) then flush it out with clean water before you re fill it.

In some spots here in the West there is very little available water and you would be hard pressed to get something that you could filter or purify, many windmills that I see now are disabled so they are no longer a reliable source of fresh water, and a lot of the old area dams are dried out or have dead things in them so you probably wouldnt want to drink from them unless you want the squirts .

Dont venture out here unless you have more water than you need for your intended stay, as even in the winter months it gets hot and dry, if you are getting some rain take the opportunity to gets some run off from your annex or tarp or whatever and top up your containers.


cheers


stayyerAU

stayyer hi
your over in the west , you`d see those test holes all over the place with the 6" pvc pipe sticking out of them.i`ve not been to WA for about 15 years but every one of those pipes i dropped a stone down , the stone hit water. on the old msn site somebody wrote about a speer they built that was simply a 2" or 3" pvc pipe with a ball check valve on the bottom of it,lowwer it down one of those test pipes,let it fill with water,then haul it out again.apparently the water is ok to drink,or put in your radiator or what ever you need it for. i`ll be taking one of those if i ever get over to wa again.

Be careful about drinking water from an old drill hole or well, especially if the drill hole has a pvc collar. This smooth collar prevents critters like goannas and snakes who go down the hole for a drink from getting back out.

Many small animals fall down these holes when looking for a drink in hot weather and cannot get back out. I have actually looked down a couple of these drill holes and seen a goanna stuck there dead. As time goes on the carcass will rot and drop back down the hole - yuck. I would have to be very thirsty to drink from one of these drill holes.

Whenever I see these drill holes with pvc collars I try to kick the collar over or shove a mulga limb down so any animal that goes down looking for water can get back up. Bloody drill companies should be heavily fined for leaving collars on drill holes.

Cheers, Jim

Granite ,

It has been mining law for the past 15 years or that all drill holes have to be plugged with a cement plug with a small plastic pipe in it.
Completed drill sites are policed regularly by DME reps who carry a big stick.
Yes there are still a few left from the good ol` days but these are still being plugged when found by resposible exploration companies.

Bloody T`Othersiders!

Driller.

granite hi
 point taken about the quality of the water.



 another way to get at least enough water to drink in an emergency (if your vehicle is running), open all the doors and turn on the air con.the water that drips under the car is clean and fresh.
 

i found a pretty good online site on how to purify water in the bush

http://www.wikihow.com/Purify-Water

Jim,
I am very happy to be a part of changes to legislation which now enforces drilling companies to cap or plug all drill holes.
Back in the early 90's we rescued two trapped Bungarra's from a drill hole. I wrote a letter to the then Premier of WA (Richard Court) explaining the need to change legislation. Happy to say this was taken up and legislation altered to save our fauna. The diamond drill holes are capped the smaller holes have a concrete tapered plug below ground level and all that is showing is a length of 15mm black poly pipe.
Unfortunately there are still 1000's of drill holes out there put down before the change.
I agree with Jim and urge anyone walking on to any of these to either put a rock on the opening or as Jim suggests poke a branch down the hole.

We carry a home made water retriever to lift water for washing, one metre of 75mm pvc with a clacker valve and a length of rope. From memory about 5 litres each pull?

Cheers
Peter

Saw this at the Sydney Power House Museum a few weeks back



http://student.designawards.com.au/application_detail.jsp?status=4&applicationID=5898

For and emergency backup purposes only....Keep 2 or 3 outsize clear heavy duty plastic bags in the vehicle - the bigger the better. These work very well as solar stills. On the northern side of trees with plenty of greenery - stuff as much green foliage as you comfortable can do without damaging the bag then drop in a stone to create a bottom weight where the water will collect. Transpiration will keep the water flowing - you can get 2+ litres a day per bag... enough to keep you alive. Make a small hole on the bottom where the water is to drain it - then reseal with a bit of string. Change the position of the bag each day.

It is the same principle as a ground or desert still.

Note: don't use any trees that produce a whitish sap when you break a small twig - the liquid is alkaline and can be a bit toxic.

John

If you're really thirsty you can actually drink your own piss;. Seen it on the Bear Grylls Surviver show the other week. Being the curious type, I tried it myself and its actually not too bad, bit of an acquired taste... like Victorian beer!. I suggest members go easy with the stuff though, as it stains your teeth and gives you bad breath (ask my ex wife )

Undertaker,
One in every crowd

Bushed-Tracker wrote:For and emergency backup purposes only....Keep 2 or 3 outsize clear heavy duty plastic bags in the vehicle - the bigger the better. These work very well as solar stills. On the northern side of trees with plenty of greenery - stuff as much green foliage as you comfortable can do without damaging the bag then drop in a stone to create a bottom weight where the water will collect. Transpiration will keep the water flowing - you can get 2+ litres a day per bag... enough to keep you alive. Make a small hole on the bottom where the water is to drain it - then reseal with a bit of string. Change the position of the bag each day.

It is the same principle as a ground or desert still.

Note: don't use any trees that produce a whitish sap when you break a small twig - the liquid is alkaline and can be a bit toxic.

John

Seen that on a Ray Mears survival programme, thought it was really clever. I think he tied the open end up to maximize the effect. A good amount of water for minimal effort.
A couple of poly bags tucked away in your kit could save your life. Nice one.

Would defy anyone to find any water source in Australia that is not contaminated by either Giardia (parastic worm that can make you REAL sick), faeces from human or animal sources (also make you very sick), pesticides and fertilizer from run-off or old mining sites. Boiling water will NOT remove all nasties. Water needs to be purified by correct process to make it safe for human consumption. About the only water safe is that falling from the sky and not collected from ground sources.

I agree water from the sky is most clean but often not available and not always present when you need it, so you have to relay your own stocks or often hart to find water resources on the ground. From my own experience a good water purifying system can be a good backup when more water is needed than you carry with you.

Happened once in Africa when the plastic water canisters on the car roof were not tided properly and dropped off, the following car could not brake in time and smashed 50% of our fresh water. We could have drove back 300km, but since all had a purifier we thought let’s put it to test. We filtered from a ditch with cloudy water. Did the job allrigt, bit of strage taste but you can help on that.

I have evaluated several water purifying systems oever the years and found, as named in the initial post, the katadyn products as the handiest one, light weight and with ¾ of a Gal. in 2 min the most productive one.
http://www.katadynngo.com/sgen/ngo-products/products/katadynshopconnect/ngo-katadyn-wasserfilter-backcountry-series-produkte/katadyn-vario/
http://www.katadyn.com/fileadmin/user_upload/katadyn_products/Downloads/Selection_Card_Filter_EN_Web.pdf

You can get these devices now for under $ 90 US and they last forever if handled properly.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000KUVVY4/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_2?pf_rd_p=1278548962&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=B0055QDJBG&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=0XWS3ZGVKF23AZ25X17Y

You even can make your own purifier. As the binding agent of most water purifier is coal, charcoal would do it for that instant, use the charcoal of your campfire (don’t use ash), smash it fine and put it in a cotton shirt above a bucket. Very slowly pour the water in the Centre. Cook the water for 5-8 minutes and you should have water save to drink. Tested and works OK.