Hills, Hollows, and Honeycomb Rock
On a rolling countryside with grassy ridges and wooded hollow, farmers till neatly around bowl-shaped depressions. Layers of limestone crop out where pasture sinks into a hole.
Streams spring out of the ground, meander along awhile, then dip underground again. The water runs clear in dry weather but swirls with much when it rains.
Sinkholes appear where soil has been slipping down cracks in the bedrock below. The hollowed-out crevices often turn into caves and subsurface channels, growing larger every time rainwater or melting snow surges through them.
No wonder there are few surface streams. Rainfall and snowmelt disappear down sinkholes and flow through underground passages. So pollution from surface or near-surface sources, such as septic systems, may drain into the groundwater that supplies private wells.
In rural areas, there are no sanitary sewers. Each household has a septic system to handle human waste, and most have a private well to supply drinking water.
But is the water good to drink?
Living With Karst - What You Can Do To Protect Soil and Groundwater!