# Your well after the drought: what to check before it runs dry *Published 2026-09-02 by FarmAI Ireland* The hosepipe ban does not apply to your well. That is not the same as your well being safe. The EPA recorded groundwater falling at every monitored site in July 2026. Almost half of those sites, 47%, sat below the long-term normal range. Wells lag the weather. If yours is going to struggle after this summer, September and October is when you will find out. ::: official-advice-banner This is a planning guide, written on 2 September 2026. It is not a health assessment of your water. If you think your well water is contaminated, contact your local authority environment section or your HSE Environmental Health Officer. ::: Most Irish farms are not on Uisce Éireann supply. So the ban story that ran all August was, for a lot of you, somebody else's story. Yours is only starting. ## Why does a well come under pressure in September and not in July? July 2026 was the driest July on record. Met Éireann measured 16mm nationally, which is 17% of the 1991-2020 average. Twenty of the 25 stations recorded absolute drought. All 25 recorded dry spells lasting between 19 and 33 days. Groundwater is the slow part of that. The EPA's July hydrology bulletin found levels down at every monitored location. Nearly half were below normal. River flows were below normal at 60% of stations, and lake and turlough levels at 36%. Here is the bit that matters for you. The EPA notes that when there is little or no rain, almost all the water flowing in streams and rivers comes from groundwater. The rock keeps paying out. Nothing goes back in. A wet week now does not fix that. Rain landing on dry ground wets the soil and feeds grass first. It takes sustained rain over weeks before water gets past the root zone and back down into the rock. So the low point arrives after the dry spell, not during it. That is why September is the month wells give trouble. It lands in the same weeks as autumn housing and the [winter fodder shortage](/read/winter-fodder-shortage-2026-teagasc-numbers). You can watch the actual numbers. Groundwater levels are recorded every 15 minutes at around 150 sites and published on EPA HydroNet. Met Éireann's [Agricultural Data Report](https://www.met.ie/forecasts/farming/agricultural-data-report) gives you seven day rainfall for 15 stations against normal. ## Does the hosepipe ban apply to your well? No. A Water Conservation Order covers water that Uisce Éireann supplies. A private well is outside it entirely. The current Order runs from 23:59 on 26 August 2026 to 23:59 on 30 September 2026. It covers 13 counties: Carlow, Cork, Dublin, Kildare, Kilkenny, Laois, Limerick, Meath, Offaly, Tipperary, Waterford, Wexford and Wicklow. One thing does catch farmers out. A group water scheme can set its own restrictions, independently of Uisce Éireann. Those do apply to you. Check your scheme's notices before you assume. Our [guide to the 2026 water conservation order](/read/july-2026-heatwave-water-rules-irish-farms) covers what the Order does and does not prohibit. ## The warning signs to watch this month None of these mean your well has failed. Together they mean it is working harder than it was in May. - The pump runs longer to fill the same trough. - You get air or spluttering at a tap or a drinker. - The water turns cloudy, sandy or discoloured. - The far end of the run loses pressure before the near end. - Troughs refill slowly while stock are actually drinking. That last one is the test Teagasc points at. Refill rate when stock are actively drinking, not refill rate on a quiet yard at nine in the morning. Take the colour change seriously. The EPA is direct on this. A change in smell, taste or colour is a strong indication that contamination has taken place. ## How much water do your stock actually need? Teagasc puts cattle intake at 10 to 15 litres per 100kg of body weight per day. The August 2026 Future Beef newsletter is more specific for suckler farms. A lactating suckler cow may need 40 to 70 litres a day in hot weather. Run your own number. Sixty lactating sucklers at the top of that range is 4,200 litres a day. That is before calves, replacements or a parlour. Volume is only half of it. Adult cattle can drink up to 14 litres a minute. Teagasc says you need 16 to 22 litres a minute of flow to keep a trough filled at peak. So a well with plenty of water in it can still fail your stock. The bottleneck is usually somewhere else. Tom Curran, Teagasc Head of Advisory Services, named the four parts to look at after this summer. Well capacity, pump capacity, water pipe bore diameter and trough capacity. Teagasc also gives you the sizing rules. Allow 5 to 7 litres of trough capacity per livestock unit. Allow 450mm of rim space per animal. ## What to do this week 1. **Time a trough refill with stock drinking.** Not on an empty yard. Note the seconds. Do it again in three weeks and compare. 2. **Walk the lines for leaks.** A stuck ballcock or a cracked pipe costs you nothing in a wet year. It costs you the well in a dry one. 3. **Watch the pump before it burns.** If it is cycling oddly or drawing air, ring your pump installer. Do not keep pulling on a struggling well and hope. 4. **Check the wellhead.** The EPA wants a septic tank and fuel tanks at least 30m away. Chemicals go at least 5m back. Fence stock at least 3m from the wellhead. 5. **Seal or fill any unused bore.** An old well nobody uses is a direct pipe from the surface into your groundwater. 6. **Decide your fallback now.** A neighbour, a group scheme connection or a tanker. Sort it while you have time, not on the morning it fails. ## Why the water that comes back can be the bigger problem When the rain finally arrives, the risk changes shape. The EPA advises testing your well after heavy rain, because contamination is likely to be high at that time. The numbers behind that advice are not comfortable. The EPA's own well protection leaflet cites a study finding E. coli in almost a third, 29%, of Irish private wells. gov.ie puts it another way. People with VTEC are over four times more likely than the general population to have drunk untreated private well water. Nobody is checking this for you. gov.ie is explicit that water services authorities do not test the quality of private supplies. Testing your well is your responsibility. The EPA went further in July 2026. Its report on private supplies states that household wells are exempt from the drinking water regulations, so they sit outside the report entirely. Testing costs about €65 for microbiological analysis and about €130 for a full drinking water test. Your local authority environment section or HSE Environmental Health Officer will point you to a laboratory. There is a second reason to think about this now. When the rain comes, slurry goes out. Landspreading should not happen within 25m of your well. Our [guide to the 2026 spreading deadlines](/read/slurry-fertiliser-deadlines-2026) sets out the full list of water buffers. ## What grants exist, and what they will not cover The individual well grant is real, and it is narrower than most people assume. Under SI 192 of 2020, your local authority can pay 85% of approved costs up to €5,000 for a new well. Rehabilitation is 85% up to €3,000. Water treatment such as filtration and UV is funded at 100% up to €1,000. The minimum threshold is €750. Read the definition before you plan around it. The scheme covers a private water supply serving only one house. It is a domestic grant. It is not a grant for your farm water system. TAMS 3 is the farm side, and it has limits too. Teagasc lists a reference cost of €2,470 per unit for a solar powered water pump and €292.22 for a nose pump. Grant aid is 60% under the Young Farmer and Women Farmer schemes, and 40% under the Animal Welfare, Nutrient Storage Scheme. The conditions are specific. Minimum investment is €2,000. Troughs fed by a solar pump must be at least 20m from the nearest watercourse. TAMS does not fund well digging or concrete bases. For scale, the EPA's well leaflet puts drilling a well and fitting a pump at €6,000 to €9,000. That figure is from published EPA guidance rather than a current quote, so get a price from a driller before you budget on it. ## Frequently asked questions **Does the hosepipe ban apply to my private well?** No. A Water Conservation Order covers water supplied by Uisce Éireann. A private well sits outside it. The current Order runs to 23:59 on 30 September 2026 in 13 counties. A group water scheme is different, because it can set its own restrictions and those do apply to you. **How much does it cost to test well water in Ireland?** The EPA puts microbiological testing at about €65 and a full drinking water test at about €130. Your local authority environment section or your HSE Environmental Health Officer will name a laboratory. Test at least once a year, and test again after heavy rain. **Is there a grant to drill a new well for my farm?** Not for the farm side of it. The individual well grant pays 85% up to €5,000, but only for a private supply serving one house. TAMS 3 lists solar water pumps at a €2,470 reference cost. It does not fund well digging. ## The bottom line The mains story ends on 30 September. The well story is only starting. Time one trough refill with stock drinking, walk your lines for leaks, and book a water test for after the first heavy rain. Those three jobs take an afternoon and cost about €65. --- ## Sources - [Met Éireann — Climate Statement for July 2026](https://www.met.ie/climate-statement-for-july-2026) — The driest July on record at 16mm, or 17% of the 1991-2020 average, with absolute drought at 20 of 25 stations - [EPA — Hydrology Summary Bulletin, July 2026](https://www.catchments.ie/hydrology-summary-bulletin-july-2026/) — Groundwater levels fell at every monitored location in July, with 47% below the long-term normal range - [EPA — Groundwater monitoring and HydroNet](https://www.epa.ie/our-services/monitoring--assessment/freshwater--marine/groundwater/) — Around 330 groundwater monitoring stations nationally, levels recorded every 15 minutes and published on EPA HydroNet - [Uisce Éireann — Water Conservation Hub](https://www.water.ie/news/water-conservation-hub) — The Water Conservation Order in force to 23:59 on 30 September 2026, the 13 counties covered and the exact prohibited uses - [gov.ie — Private wells (Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage)](https://www.gov.ie/en/department-of-housing-local-government-and-heritage/publications/private-wells/) — The individual well grant rates under SI 192 of 2020, and the fact that authorities do not test private supplies - [EPA — Have you checked your well water supply?](https://www.epa.ie/media/epa-2020/environment-amp-you/drinking-water/Private-wells-protection-leaflet.pdf) — EPA well protection leaflet: the 29% E. coli finding, testing costs, well construction and the setback distances from a wellhead - [EPA — Take action on drinking water](https://www.epa.ie/take-action/in-the-home/drinking-water/) — How often to test a private well, why to test after heavy rain, and who to contact if the result comes back positive - [EPA — Drinking water quality in private supplies continues to present public health risks (29 July 2026)](https://www.epa.ie/news-releases/news-releases-2026/drinking-water-quality-in-private-supplies-continues-to-present-public-health-risks.php) — 2025 results for private group schemes and small private supplies, and confirmation that household wells are exempt from the drinking water regulations - [Teagasc — Grazing focus: don't let water be the weak link on your farm](https://teagasc.ie/news--events/daily/grazing-focus-dont-let-water-be-the-weak-link-on-your-farm/) — Cattle water intake per 100kg, peak flow rates, trough volume per livestock unit and trough rim space - [Teagasc — Building resilience into Irish farming systems to future dry spells](https://teagasc.ie/news--events/daily/building-resilience-into-irish-farming-systems-to-future-dry-spells/) — Tom Curran, Teagasc Head of Advisory Services, on the four parts of a farm water system to check after this summer - [Teagasc — August 2026 Future Beef newsletter](https://teagasc.ie/animals/beef/demonstration-farms/future-beef-programme/newsletters/august-2026-future-beef-newsletter/) — Daily water requirement for lactating suckler cows in hot weather, and the dry weather grazing advice for August 2026 - [Teagasc — Solar powered water pumps and nose pumps available under TAMS](https://www.teagasc.ie/news--events/daily/environment/solar-powered-water-pumps-and-nose-pumps-available-under-tams.php) — TAMS 3 reference costs and grant rates for solar water pumps and nose pumps, and what the scheme will not fund - [Met Éireann — Agricultural Data Report](https://www.met.ie/forecasts/farming/agricultural-data-report) — Seven day rainfall, soil temperature and sunshine totals for 15 stations, with each figure shown against normal --- *Source: [FarmAI Ireland](https://farmai.ie/read/private-wells-september-2026)*