Over 15 million U.S. households regularly depend on private groundwater wells.
"One thing we highly recommend is that you firm it up a little bit around the well casing so that the water goes away from the well so that way water doesn't pool up right there and potentially go down into the ground water," said Erik Kleiman, owner of Kleiman Pump & Well Drilling.
Erik Kleiman installs private wells into homes, and he says in order to make sure your ground water is safe, every well cap should have a seal.
"This is an old type of well cap that does not have a rubber seal in here so you can see where things might have crawled in here and some spider webs and things like that," Kleiman said. "The new well caps that we have to install meet the new different type of code. They actually have a rubber seal that would seal on the outer diameter of the well casing, and there's no way for anything really to get in here."
Well water should be tested once a year during the spring or after it rains. Sample test bottles can be found at your local health department or township hall.
"A coliform test is basically a quick and dirty test to establish whether or not you may or may not have a compromise to your well. Coliform bacteria aren't pathogenic bacteria generally. They're just bacteria that aren't typically found in ground water," said Patrick Jacuzzo, director of environmental health of Marquette.