Probable cause

I have discovered the probable cause for my pipes, which once upon a time froze rarely, now freezing every winter.

I knew part of the pipe from the well (some distance away for the house) was above ground, not buried. Some scraping away of fir needles, cones and moss revealed that the exposed portion was longer than I thought. Took a picture and took it to the hardware store to ask the chap who would know what I should do. He recommended heat tape, which I purchased. Before trying to figure out how to install it (and whether this was something I could do single handed), I began to wonder if I’d bought the right length, so I did some more scraping.

Gulp. The above ground pipe goes all the way to the top of the slope.

Quite a bit of it is still wrapped in pink insulation and plastic, but in other places this has rotted away.

Hmm. Decided to post something about the problem on Facebook, hoping some manly man (or woman) of my acquaintance could offer some advice and help.

Various suggestions were made, all of which rejected heat tape as the solution to the problem.

After a few of these, I wrote my own comment: “Thanks for all the suggestions – even if I was hoping someone would say, “I think I can help you with that. Let me come over and have a look.” After this, Mr Fixit (now in his eighties with bad knees) offered to come over for a look yesterday afternoon.

Bad news, I’m afraid. It seems the unburied pipe goes well past the top of the slope, probably all the way to the well. Exposing this will take a fair bit of time and a lot of shifting of small fallen trees (which will probably require a saw) and large branches. A lot of work, but I can do that.

What I genuinely don’t think I can do on my own is what comes after the exposing of the pipe – a multi-layered insulation job. Paying someone to do this for me would cost hundreds of dollars I don’t have. I am hoping, when the time comes, one of those manly men will offer to help. (In the past, Mr Fixit would have been enthusiastically all over this project, but that was before the bad knees.)

Oh, and… He identified this often handy tap near the house as an obvious freezing point.

I’ll need to make sure it has its own insulation in the winter. (A tiny little knitted hat, perhaps?)

All of which would have made for a pretty depressing day.

Fortunately, my friend Jean needed me to take the delightful Dexter for a walk, which cheered me up no end.

And you know what? This time of year just looking out the kitchen window makes me happy.

Especially when, as was the case a moment before I snapped this photo, there was not one, but two hummingbirds at the feeder.

Okay, guess I better start digging. Yikes.