Well Water Problems
When the rust builds slime, you don't have an iron problem — you have a biology problem.
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Iron bacteria are microorganisms that eat dissolved iron and manganese for energy and leave behind rust-colored slime. They don't just stain — they build biofilm: gelatinous deposits that coat well casings, clog pump screens and pressure tanks, foul softeners, and give water a swampy odor. If the inside of your toilet tank is lined with reddish-brown ooze, that's bacterial iron, not ordinary rust.
This distinction matters because the treatments differ. Dissolved iron responds to standard iron removal. Iron bacteria laugh at it — the slime shields the colony, and equipment plugs up. They also frequently keep company with sulfur-reducing bacteria, so a well with bacterial iron often has the rotten-egg smell too.
The playbook that works: a proper shock chlorination of the well and plumbing to knock the colony down, then — because regrowth is the norm in an infected well — continuous chlorine injection with a contact tank to keep it suppressed, followed by filtration to remove the oxidized iron and a carbon polish to remove the chlorine before your taps. Our forensic water analysis confirms what's iron, what's bacteria, and what's both.
Lift the lid. Slimy red-brown coating = iron bacteria. Clear water with orange stains elsewhere = dissolved iron. Different problems, different fixes.
Get it tested →Biofilm shields the colony and plugs equipment — a filter sized for dissolved iron fouls fast against bacterial iron.
Iron removal →Shock chlorination first, continuous chlorine injection with contact time after — suppression is a program, not an event.
Chlorine injection →Sulfur bacteria and coliform ride along in infected wells — one disinfection strategy should handle the whole population.
Well bacteria →The tells: reddish-brown slime inside the toilet tank, a rainbow oily sheen on standing water, stringy rust-colored strands, and stains that come back fast after cleaning. Ordinary dissolved iron stains too — but it doesn't build slime.
They're not considered a health threat, but they're a plumbing menace — the biofilm clogs pumps, screens, and pressure tanks, feeds other bacteria, worsens sulfur smells, and can foul a softener or filter that wasn't designed for it.
Shock chlorination knocks iron bacteria back but rarely eliminates an established colony — regrowth is the norm. Persistent cases need continuous treatment: chlorine injection with contact time, then filtration.
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