How hard is the water in Ness County, KS?
28.6 grains per gallon
A softener will pay its way here.
The median hardness measured in Ness County, KS is 490 mg/L as calcium carbonate, which is 28.6 gpg. That is very hard on the USGS scale. It comes from 170 samples at 4 sites between 1990 and 2018, drawn from every sampling site in the county, wells and surface water together.
How much it varies here
Half the sites came in between 26 and 34.8 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 28.6 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 25.1 to 46.5 gpg
The softest single sample on record in Ness County was 430 mg/L and the hardest 796 mg/L, a 2-fold gap. The top quarter of sites read above 34.8 gpg and the bottom quarter below 26 gpg.
Wells 46.5 gpg, rivers and lakes 26.3 gpg
1 groundwater samples from 1 wells put the median at 796 mg/L. 169 surface samples from 3 sites put it at 450 mg/L. In Ness County the wells come out 20.2 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 625 lb of salt a year (16 bags of 40 lb, about $113), 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 $213 a year.
Sizing at 28.6 gpg
| People | Grains a day | Unit | Salt a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1,716 | 24,000 | 209 lb |
| 2 | 3,432 | 32,000 | 418 lb |
| 4 | 6,864 | 64,000 | 835 lb |
| 6 | 10,296 | 80,000 | 1,253 lb |
Ness County against the rest of Kansas
Among the 105 Kansas counties with data, Ness County is number 14 of 105 counting from the hardest. Across the whole country it is harder than 94% of counties.
Softest in Kansas: Woodson County at 6.3 gpg. Hardest: Linn County at 114.5 gpg. Closest to Ness County: Clark County (28.6), Smith County (29.1), Barber County (27.7).