How hard is the water in Lamb County, TX?
22.1 grains per gallon
A softener will pay its way here.
The median hardness measured in Lamb County, TX is 379 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 22.1 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 10 samples at 10 sites between 2001 and 2003, 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 19.8 and 31.9 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: medium (how it is measured).
What to do next
At 22.1 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 15.6 to 64.8 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Lamb County was 267 mg/L and the hardest 1,110 mg/L, a 4-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 31.9 gpg and the bottom quarter below 19.8 gpg.
What a softener would cost to run
For a household of 3, a 32,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 484 lb of salt a year (13 bags of 40 lb, about $87), 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 $187 a year.
Sizing at 22.1 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1,326 | 24,000 | 161 lb |
| 2 | 2,652 | 24,000 | 323 lb |
| 4 | 5,304 | 40,000 | 645 lb |
| 6 | 7,956 | 64,000 | 968 lb |
Lamb County against the rest of Texas
Among the 217 Texas counties with data, Lamb County is number 49 of 217 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 88% of counties.
Softest in Texas: Nacogdoches County at 0.3 gpg. Hardest: Ward County at 218.5 gpg. Closest to Lamb County: Irion County (22.1), Tarrant County (22), Menard County (22.4).