How hard is the water in Mitchell County, TX?
44.9 grains per gallon
A softener will pay its way here.
The median hardness measured in Mitchell County, TX is 769 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 44.9 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 208 samples at 3 sites between 1990 and 2003, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 44.6 and 53.9 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 44.9 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 44.3 to 62.8 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Mitchell County was 758 mg/L and the hardest 1,075 mg/L, a 1-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 53.9 gpg and the bottom quarter below 44.6 gpg.
What a softener would cost to run
For a household of 3, a 64,000-grain unit covers a week between regenerations. Expect about 981 lb of salt a year (25 bags of 40 lb, about $177), 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 $277 a year.
Sizing at 44.9 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2,694 | 24,000 | 328 lb |
| 2 | 5,388 | 40,000 | 656 lb |
| 4 | 10,776 | 80,000 | 1,311 lb |
| 6 | 16,164 | twin tank | 1,967 lb |
Mitchell County against the rest of Texas
Among the 217 Texas counties with data, Mitchell County is number 20 of 217 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 97% of counties.
Softest in Texas: Nacogdoches County at 0.3 gpg. Hardest: Ward County at 218.5 gpg. Closest to Mitchell County: Baylor County (45.3), Leon County (44), Pecos County (46).