Water trouble in Costilla County? Here's what's likely going on.
Costilla County sits at the northern edge of the Rio Grande Basin, where high-desert altitude, clay-heavy soils, and aging rural infrastructure put real stress on water systems. Water Works Plus covers the full county — from San Luis and Fort Garland to Chama, Garcia, and the valley communities — for everything from the well to your building's exterior wall. We don't drill wells, which means we have no reason to push you toward one when something cheaper will fix it.
- National Ground Water Association
- Colorado Water Well Contractors Association
- Bonded & insured
- Free estimates and project quotes
What's happening out here
Costilla County water systems fail in recognizable patterns.
The San Luis Valley's elevation, alkaline groundwater, and wide temperature swings age well equipment faster than lower country. Most calls we get follow one of these four patterns.
What we do here
Supply-side service, well to building — across all of Costilla County.
Every town and rural parcel in the county is in our service area. The work we do is everything between the well and the point where water enters your building.
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Well pumps and motors
Submersible and above-ground pumps, pull-and-replace service, and motor testing. We diagnose before we quote, so you're not replacing a pump when the tank was the problem.
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Pressure tanks
Bladder-style pressure tanks — what looks like a propane tank near your pressure switch — lose their air charge over time. Replacement is usually the most cost-effective first step when pressure is erratic.
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Water lines and well heads
Buried line repair and replacement, pitless adapter service, and well-head sealing. Freeze damage and shifting clay soils crack lines on rural Costilla County properties more often than most places.
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Cisterns and water delivery
Some parcels in the county — particularly in the Culebra Range foothills and around Garcia — rely on cisterns rather than wells. We install, repair, and can coordinate delivery to keep them filled.
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Septic systems
Supply and waste are separate systems, but they live on the same property. We handle septic installation and repair so you're not coordinating two contractors for work that happens in the same trench.
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Filtration and water treatment
Sediment filters, iron filters, and softening systems sized for San Luis Valley water chemistry. All work stays outside the building — we stop at the building envelope.
We work supply-side only — from the well to your building's exterior wall — and do not service interior plumbing, fixtures, water heaters, drains, or drill new wells.
How a service call goes
What happens from your first call to a working system.
We keep the process simple because rural properties in Costilla County often mean long drives and limited return windows. Here's the usual sequence.
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Call and describe what you're seeing
You call (719) 859-1148 — answered 24 hours Monday through Saturday. Tell us the symptom in plain terms. We'll ask a few questions to narrow down what to bring before we're 75 miles out.
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Free estimate on site
We come out, test the system, and give you a written estimate at no charge. We name likely causes in order of cost so you know what the cheap fix is before we talk about anything bigger.
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Repair or replace — your call
Most pressure and pump problems are repairs, not replacements. We'll tell you honestly when a repair buys you a year versus when replacement makes more sense over time.
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Any needed excavation
If the problem is a buried line or a tank swap that requires digging, we handle that ourselves — no subcontractor delay. Clay and caliche soils in Costilla County require equipment matched to the ground, and we bring it.
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Test before we leave
System runs to normal pressure and we verify flow at the meter before the truck leaves the property. The work carries a one-year warranty on labor and materials.
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Equipment warranty
As an authorized dealer, installed equipment carries a five-year manufacturer warranty. We document it for you so you know exactly what's covered and for how long.
If something isn't right with your water in Costilla County, call (719) 859-1148 and we'll figure out together what it's likely to be.
- Free estimates — we quote after we diagnose
- One year on labor and materials
- Colorado License #1447
Why the cheap answer is safe to give
We can afford to tell you it is the cheap part
Not because we are nicer than the next outfit. Because of how this business is built — and all three of these are checkable.
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No rig to keep busy
A drilling rig is the most expensive thing a water contractor can own, and it has to stay working to pay for itself. We do not own one. A new well is not on our list of answers, because we could not drill it if we wanted to.
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We are a dealer, not a manufacturer
Authorized dealer — that is where the five-year equipment warranty comes from. We do not build pumps and we do not carry a quota on them. A pump we talk you out of costs us nothing.
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A wrong diagnosis comes back to us
One year on labor and materials means we are the ones who drive back out if the fix does not hold. Guessing expensive is not only dishonest here — it is expensive for us.
None of that is a claim about our character. You do not have to take our word for any of it — the license, the association memberships and the warranty terms are all verifiable, and they are the same on paper as they are on this page.
Questions we get asked
Before you call
We cover all of Costilla County — Garcia, Jaroso, Chama, Mesita, San Acacio, and the rural parcels between them. Our service radius is 75 miles from Weston, which takes in the full county. Distance doesn't change what we charge for the work itself.
Not necessarily. Low yield can come from a failing pump, a clogged screen at the bottom of the casing, a drop in the water table, or an actual formation problem. The first three are serviceable; only the last one points toward drilling. We don't drill wells — we have no financial stake in that answer — so if it turns out you genuinely need a new well, we'll tell you and refer you to a driller rather than guess our way to that conclusion.
The Rio Grande Basin covers most of southern Colorado's aquifer water. In Costilla County that means groundwater tends to run alkaline, often high in dissolved solids and iron. It also means your well and water rights operate under basin-specific rules. You can read those rules on our well rules page for the Rio Grande Basin.
Yes. At Costilla County elevations, pressure systems cycle more often, and mineral content in the water is hard on bladders. A tank that might last 10 years at lower elevation can fail in five. A quick pressure test tells us definitively — it's the first thing we check because it's the cheapest thing on the list.
Yes. Cistern repair and replacement is part of what we do. Some areas around the foothills and smaller communities in Costilla County rely on cisterns rather than drilled wells, and delivery plus a properly sealed tank is a real long-term option. We can talk through what makes sense for your property.
If it's outside the building — the tank, the leach field, the line from the house to the tank — that's us. Interior drain lines, toilets, and fixtures are a plumber's work, and we'll say so plainly rather than take a job we shouldn't.
Labor and materials carry a one-year warranty. Equipment installed through us carries a five-year manufacturer warranty — we're an authorized dealer, so that warranty is documented and registered. We go over both before we leave the property.
No. Estimates and project quotes are free. We come out, look at the system, and tell you what we found and what it would cost to fix it — in order from cheapest to most expensive — and you decide from there.
If your question isn't here, call (719) 859-1148 — someone answers 24 hours Monday through Saturday, and a real conversation about your specific system is always more useful than a list. Call (719) 859-1148
Before we arrive
A few things that make the service call go faster.
You don't need to know what's wrong — that's our job. But a little information on hand saves time when we're an hour from the nearest supply house.
- Know where your pressure switch is. It's usually a small box mounted near the pressure tank with two wires running into it — knowing its location saves us time tracing the system from scratch.
- Note when the problem started and what changed. A power outage, a hard freeze, a stretch of high use — any of those details narrow the diagnosis before we pull a single tool.
- If you have a well log or any paperwork from the original installation, pull it out. Depth, casing size, and pump specs from the original job tell us a lot. Don't worry if you don't have it — older properties often don't, and we work around it.
- Check whether neighbors on the same road are having water issues too. In communities sharing a small system or drawing from the same aquifer zone, a neighbor's experience can confirm or rule out a wider problem quickly.
You don't need to have any of this ready — it just helps if you do.
Tell us what the water is doing.
We’ll tell you what it usually turns out to be, what it will take to confirm it, and what it costs — before we touch anything.
Call (719) 859-1148Answering 24 hours a day, Monday through Saturday
- Colorado License #1447 · bonded and insured
- One year on labor and materials, five on equipment
- Free estimates and project quotes — we quote after we diagnose
- NGWA and Colorado Water Well Contractors Association
Or have us call you back
If you are on bad signal or would rather not talk right now.