How hard is the water in Bandera County, TX?
30.5 grains per gallon
A softener will pay its way here.
The median hardness measured in Bandera County, TX is 522 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 30.5 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 45 samples at 22 sites between 1990 and 2016, drawn from groundwater wells, which is what most taps and private wells in the county draw on.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 22.2 and 46 gpg. The whole middle of that range gives the same answer, so a test of your own tap is unlikely to change it. Confidence in the county figure: high (how it is measured).
What to do next
At 30.5 gpg a softener pays its way here. Before you buy, check the quoted unit's grain capacity against the sizing table below, and ask whether it regenerates on demand, which uses less salt than a timer. Call your utility for its own report if you are on city water.
More on sizing a softener for your household.
From 13.9 to 136.7 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Bandera County was 238 mg/L and the hardest 2,340 mg/L, a 10-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 46 gpg and the bottom quarter below 22.2 gpg.
Wells 30.5 gpg, rivers and lakes 14.3 gpg
45 groundwater samples from 22 wells put the median at 521.5 mg/L. 13 surface samples from 2 sites put it at 244 mg/L. In Bandera County the wells come out 16.2 gpg harder. Groundwater sits in contact with rock for years and picks up calcium and magnesium as it goes, so wells usually read harder. A utility here that draws from the river can deliver noticeably different water from a private well next door.
What a softener would cost to run
For a household of 3, a 40,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 665 lb of salt a year (17 bags of 40 lb, about $120), and roughly 2,346 gallons of regeneration water. Installed, most units run $1,000 to $4,500; spread over 15 years with salt, that is about $220 a year.
Sizing at 30.5 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1,830 | 24,000 | 223 lb |
| 2 | 3,660 | 32,000 | 445 lb |
| 4 | 7,320 | 64,000 | 891 lb |
| 6 | 10,980 | 80,000 | 1,336 lb |
Bandera County against the rest of Texas
Among the 217 Texas counties with data, Bandera County is number 31 of 217 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 95% of counties.
Softest in Texas: Nacogdoches County at 0.3 gpg. Hardest: Ward County at 218.5 gpg. Closest to Bandera County: Shackelford County (29.9), Martin County (29.7), Gaines County (32).