To improve a spring, first open up the channel and drain out all the water possible. Clean out the spring so as to increase its flow. Lay the necessary feed pipes to the house and barn. Wall up the well of the spring with concrete blocks, laid without mortar to a point just above the in-flow streams of the spring. Complete the walls with blocks laid in 1: 2 cement-sand mortar, or, using wooden forms, with a 6-inch solid wall of 1: 2: 4 concrete. Carry these walls high enough to keep surface water out of the spring well. If the spring is to be used as a drinking tank for stock, make the walls equal to the usual depth of such tanks. ([See Watering Troughs and Tanks], page 74.) Lay a 4-inch floor of 1: 2½: 5 concrete (on a drainage foundation) 10 feet around the field spring on all sides.
At the edges of the floor, turn down a concrete “apron” or foundation, 2 feet into the ground, the same as for [Feeding Floors], page 43. This prevents the frost from getting under the floor and cracking it.
Make provision for the over-flow at a point where it can be carried to the stream by a gutter in the floor, or by a drain tile under it.
With such improvement, since there is no mud, the stock cannot mire and the udders of the dairy cows are always clean.
To keep rats and rabbits out of springs from which the water is drawn for house use, provide a concrete cover like that described for [Underground Cisterns], page 69. For small springs this cover is often made removable as [ shown in the photograph] on page 73.
