How hard is the water in Ellsworth County, KS?
19 grains per gallon
A softener will pay its way here.
The median hardness measured in Ellsworth County, KS is 325 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 19 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 262 samples at 8 sites between 1990 and 2016, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 10.3 and 27.3 gpg. That spread crosses a decision line, so some homes here land on a different answer. A $10 test strip on your own tap settles it. Confidence in the county figure: medium (how it is measured).
What to do next
At 19 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. Because Ellsworth County straddles a decision line, check your own tap with a $10 test strip before you spend anything.
More on sizing a softener for your household.
From 5.2 to 31.3 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Ellsworth County was 89 mg/L and the hardest 535 mg/L, a 6-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 27.3 gpg and the bottom quarter below 10.3 gpg.
What a softener would cost to run
For a household of 3, a 24,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 415 lb of salt a year (11 bags of 40 lb, about $75), 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 $175 a year.
Sizing at 19 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1,140 | 24,000 | 139 lb |
| 2 | 2,280 | 24,000 | 277 lb |
| 4 | 4,560 | 32,000 | 555 lb |
| 6 | 6,840 | 48,000 | 832 lb |
Ellsworth County against the rest of Kansas
Among the 105 Kansas counties with data, Ellsworth County is number 36 of 105 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 81% of counties.
Softest in Kansas: Woodson County at 6.3 gpg. Hardest: Linn County at 114.5 gpg. Closest to Ellsworth County: Nemaha County (19.5), Reno County (18.4), Haskell County (18.2).