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As the author of Living Clay Nature’s, Own Miracle Cure, I am
frequently asked the question, “Will taking clay baths cause build up
in my septic systems?” For the answer I went to an expert on the
subject, Lawrence Luecking.
Perry A~
www.livingclaybook.com
The following article should not be viewed as anything other than
general guidance.
Should I Worry About Draining Bath
Clay Into My Septic System?
©
Lawrence Luecking, 2008
As a former designer of residences,
licensed builder and one who has constructed many residences on septic
systems I will opine that: if your septic was designed adequately and
is working properly the heavier clay particles will never get to the
leach field. They'll settle [by their own weight] to the bottom
of the septic tank compartments just as a teaspoon of clay does when
you put it into a glass to drink.
Contrary to popular belief and the desires of [most of] the Septic
Tank Pumping Services to extricate as much of your $ as possible while
extricating septic wastes, a septic system should endure for upwards
of twenty years without ever needing to be pumped. It’s a living and
continuing reaction like a 'breeder' in that the bacteria consume the
solid wastes and thrive on them! It’s a living entity made up of
trillions of
anaerobic bacteria
[tiny micro
organisms that live and function in the absence of oxygen and light]
and consume organic waste products. Like a human body, a Septic
system does not like acidic materials and if enough coffee grounds,
drain cleaning products, household cleansers and the like are emptied
into the tank, you'll eventually kill these tiny friendly bacteria and
the system will fail and indeed need to be pumped. I always made it a
point to advise anyone for whom I built to avoid putting such
materials into the house drains and toilets and I was never aware of
any system I installed ever having a need to be pumped. I am
currently aware of one system that I installed in the late seventies
which still functions and has never been pumped.
Now, addressing the leach field proper, IF somehow clay did get to the
leach field it would eventually seep into the rock bedding materials
under the lines that distribute the effluents but, based upon the
relative large size of any leach field it would take many years and an
incredible amount of clay to establish a membrane that would arrest
the permeability of the leach field. Since the tank itself functions
on a floatation process as the solid wastes are digested by the
anaerobic bacteria, clay, heavy by nature at approximately 68
lbs/cubic foot, would seem to settle to the bottom of the tank [there
is no significant turbulence in the tank] and not ever get to the
leach field. Since by design the digestion of wastes is accomplished
before leaving the tank proper, what goes into the leach filed is, for
the most part only water.
Bentonite can, by
function of its [clay] particles, create an impervious material that
does not allow for solutions to seep through, and is, as such, one of
the materials used to line manmade lakes and ponds to prevent it from leaking/seeping into the ground! Again, it would take a very
long time and many hundreds of pounds of clay to clog a leach field.
Contrary to the tanks, leach fields can, by nature and the local soil
constituency, and what is put into them, eventually build up deposits
and sometimes need to be dug up and replaced.
In synopsis, if
you do the math related to tank volume and frequency of your baths and
amounts of clay used, it would take years of clay baths before
significant build up would dictate tank pumping. If/when that might
happen a thorough pumping of the tank, with a special focus on
reaching the bottom of the tank, would remove the majority of any clay
residue. Look at it this way, how many 5 lb bags of clay would you
have to put into your septic tank to establish a layer an inch thick?
That of course, depends upon how many baths and how many cups of clay
per bath, but still, a very long time: while a one cup clay bath taken
weekly could generate [approximately] 26 lb of clay residue in a year,
it would, at this rate, require 2.6 years to deposit a cubic foot of
clay in an average 1500 gallon tank. Since a cubic foot would occupy
only 1,728 square inches [at a one inch thickness] and there are
approximately 7,200 square inches of tank space on a flat bottomed
concrete tank, it would take 4.16 years, to accumulate a mere inch of
deposit, not in my opinion an amount that would be deleterious to the
tank’s function.
©
Lawrence Luecking, 2008
Following the
release of this article on the
AboutClay yahoo group, it was validated by this testimony
of Darla's experience with clay and a 50 year old septic tank:
I've been giving my daughter, who is recovering from Asperger's, SID and
Pandas, an average
of 3 baths a week for the last year, with 3-4 cups of clay in each one. I don't use a strainer; I wash every bit of it down
the drain and I haven't had the first bit of trouble. In fact, it
seems like all my drains work better now than they did before clay. I used to get
the drains unplugged a couple times a year for other reasons, but
haven't had a problem since I started using clay. I'm on a septic system that is 50 years old and I've used
several different kinds of clays.
Darla S.
Lawrence (Luke)
Luecking, a career builder and construction consultant, began his
quest for better health and nutrition in his late teens. He is a
practicing nutritionist in Colorado with successful focuses on
Nutritional approaches to healing disease including Cancer, balanced
body pH, brain and memory clearing, and the relationship of
environmental toxins to Parasite entry into the human body, and
Bio-electric medicine parasite eradication. To contact Luke at Nutricon email
wmlua06@yahoo.com
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