Do you sit on a Gold mine?

 Many people in dry lands knows the value of water, to say that ‘water is life’ is more relevant to them than those in higher potential areas. People here have to go an extra mile and excavate the ground in search for the precious commodity.  

  Underground water is more reliable than any other source; this is because the water is always available. Most of the serious farmers prefer digging boreholes. The only challenge that most of them face is how to determine the exact location for underground water. There are some of the ways of detecting underground that have been tested proved to work.

 One farmer Mr. Kanyoko who is a teacher by profession thought of digging a borehole though he had no information about it. One day as he was chatting with his colleague they happened to talk about water, and in the process he got information about a man who have successfully located for over 200 wells.  Mr. Kamau who works for ‘Tree is life trust’ (T.I.L.T) is well known because for his involvement in many activities. Mr. Kanyoko contacted him and was helpful in locating a good site for sinking the well.

 How to locate underground water.

 Mr. Kamau uses two ‘L’ shaped copper wires. The wires are held loosely in front of the body as a person moves freely in an open field.  The wires are held loosely to allow free swinging towards the area with underground water, at some point the wires crisscrosses and that is the exact center for sinking the well.  

  Kamau have a way of knowing even the number of inlets and out lets of the inner water channels, for Mr. Kanyoko’s cases he identified, 13 inlets that brought water to that point.

 He also said that the well should be dug 58-60 feet to get more reliable water. At first Mr. Kanyoko was somewhat pessimistic on digging the borehole, because he had heard of other people who dug deeper holes with no signs of water, but he went ahead and dug the well after all. It was during a dry season and he needed a stable source of water for his family use.

 After digging up 25 feet he got some little water but continued up to 65 feet and that is where he got more water such that the diggers could not go any further because they could hear some sounds indicating that underground water table was too near. He appreciated Mr. Kamau’s estimation because it was accurate.

 After the borehole was completed the level of water rose 15 feet’s higher and the water helped him very much. The water height also depends on the amount of rainfall, if the rainfall is much the level of water raises and vice versa.

 Costing and the advantages of Borehole.

 The cost of digging a borehole is Ksh 200 for the first ten feet and addition of Ksh. 50 for every 10 additional feet’s, meaning that the cost is dependent on depth and hardness of the hole.

  In spite of the high cost of digging a borehole, Kanyoko have benefited in many ways because the money he used to buy water from neighbors can now be used on other important things. He has also been able to do small scale farming without any difficulties.

In his farm he grows tomatoes, mangoes, cabbages and kales, both for domestic and commercial purposes. He is also planning to start fish farming. Currently Kanyoko have got over 3,300 plants of cabbages and 1000meters of drips irrigation lines.

 Methods of pumping water from the borehole

Mr. Kanyoko gets water from his borehole by pumping using a generator, he also have a motor engine that he uses, because the borehole is less than 100 meters from the garden where he does his drip irrigation.

  Future plan

After realizing that he was sitting on a ‘gold mine’ Kanyoko is now planning to make money throughout the year. ‘‘ When the water started flowing out of the borehole, I saw money flowing nothing else” said the happy Mr. Kanyoko. He is also planning to be self-employed in the garden by starting other new projects like zero grazing. But all these are dependent on the outcome of the current projects.

 Recommendation

Mr. Kanyoko recommends that people do the same, that is dig borehole and harvest underground water that will help them boost their farm out comes and this would increase their living standards. The government should also help farmers by digging many boreholes at the villages level.

Report written by Sam Githumbi and Bett Kipsang