2 Everyday Tips For Taking Care Of Your New Home's Septic Tank

If you recently moved into a new home with a septic tank, you may wonder if there is anything special you need to do to keep the system working properly. If so, use the following everyday tips for taking care of your new home's septic tank.

Do Laundry Throughout the Week

If you have always washed your clothes on the same day over the weekend, you may want to change your routine. While doing all of your laundry in a single day is acceptable when you lived in an area with a city sewage system, having that much gray water flowing into your septic system could throw it off balance.

Every time you wash a load of laundry, a large amount of water rushes into the septic tank at once. This water then disturbs the waste material for a little while before it settles back down so it can continue decomposing.

However, if you wash four or five loads back to back, the wastewater and materials are constantly disturbed. And, because of all of the extra water inside the tank, you run the risk of having it overflow and stop up the system, especially if it has been more than a few years since the tank was pumped.

Instead of washing all of your laundry on one day, spread it the loads during the week. You can either wash a load a day or once every other day. This reduces the stress on your septic system and gives everything time to settle until the next load.

Flush Only Toilet Paper and Waste Materials

Another way you can help keep your septic system healthy is to only flush waste material and toilet paper down the toilet. Even if a product, such as feminine hygiene or bathroom wipes, says you can flush it, do not do it. While these may be safe to flush with a regular sewage line, they can make your septic tank overflow.

Although these products are said to be biodegradable, the claim does not hold up inside a septic system. Since the system relies on natural decomposition and bacteria to reduce the amount of waste in the tank, anything that goes down the toilet needs to be designed to break down quickly.

If you flush wipes or tampons into the septic tank, these items will take a long time to decompose. While one or two may not overflow your tank, flushing these products on a regular basis will cause your tank to back up.

After a couple of years, the tank will overflow and may start leaking out into the ground surrounding it if not pumped more frequently than your septic service recommends.

You also need to be careful about the type of toilet paper you choose. While you may like the extra thick sheets that have more than two plies, they may be too thick for your septic tank. Make sure you read on the package that the paper is safe for use for septic system. 

Also, no matter what the toilet paper, use only as much as needed to get the job done. Flushing thick wads of paper can cause clogs in your system, making it overflow either back up into the sewer line or the ground around it.

Even if you are careful and follow all of the tips above, you may notice that your tank is showing signs of failure. If so, check out sites like http://www.southernsanitarysystems.com and contact a business that offers septic tank repair services so they can inspect your system and discuss with you what needs to be done next to keep your septic system operations, whether it be repairing or pumping out the tank.