Is it ever excusable to dump grey tanks on ground?

[FredKate]

As a campground host for the NFS last year, there was a 250 gallon tank to dump our black tank but for the gray tank we were told to just dump it in the forest behind us. I have a macerator and used a 100 ft hose to keep the smell away from the coach

[hikerjohn66]

Originally Posted by Homeby5

As a newbie...thinking out loud while recovering from flu like symptoms in a CG.
Is there a non emergency situation where you would consider dumping your grey tanks on ground? No dump station near? Etc... Is it ever acceptable in a non emergency situation or should it be treated like the black tank?
Discuss...

I have had to do it in some state parks. I try to run a hose out into the woods. It's mostly shower water and state parks have outdoor showers for bathers.

There now. Am I rationalizing?

Some private parks in the North East provide tubes sticking up from the ground for gray water hoses that, my guess, go to 50 gallon drums with slits in them buried in the ground.

[D Gardiner]

Have not had the need to dump gray water before. Normally we need to go flush the black tank hose when dumping.
Now,…with that said, we hand wipe our dishes, use bio degradable soap and shampoo. If we had to dump gray water, it would only be wash-water. We also have a hose fitting on our discharge cap to which we can fit a hose.
Plus, we would not do this in a developed campground where your neighbors area door is just feet from our discharge pipe. That would be poor form.

[Monkey Run]

The sewer pump trucks dump on vacant land all the time. Now it's more restricted in NYS but I would be other states it's still done.

[THenne1713]

Originally Posted by Homeby5

As a newbie...thinking out loud while recovering from flu like symptoms in a CG.
Is there a non emergency situation where you would consider dumping your grey tanks on ground? No dump station near? Etc... Is it ever acceptable in a non emergency situation or should it be treated like the black tank?
Discuss...

I believe I read ok in some gov BLM properties, but check agency first. In many campgrounds, especially. Crowded/ often used, gray water food remnants can attract ants, bees, insects, and wildlife, and make site a nuisance, so forbidden?

[wkayl]

We stayed at a friend's rural property for 11 weeks while we had sold our home and was purchasing another. By his permission we dumped grey water on the ground with a 50 ft garden hose. A semi aired climate. The area I dumped was green almost all summer while surrounding area dried up.

[eddndee]

At home, i dump my gray water onto my gravel driveway when ever I am flushing my gray water tank. No big deal.

[twogypsies]

Originally Posted by Psneeld

True it does smell....

But because the volume a full tank dumped at one time would probably smell bad and look bad too (maybe).

But if like me and maybe others.... if you leave the gray tank open and out through a garden hose, and change the end location a couple times a day....the total amount drained barely smells at all (at least mine doesn't) and there is an almost imperceptible amount of solids (granted I am an RV of 2 people, not a family of 8).

The one or two times I did detect smell after dumping, I hit it with a hose for a second or three and the smell was all but gone...definitely within less than an hour, the small spots drained dry up quickly and the suns UV tends to start destroying any bacteria rather quickly, this less smell and bacterial issues.

I don't know if backpacker mag still recommends for wilderness campers to smear feces on sun baked rock for quicker environmental degradation than burying it, but they did a few years back. How do you like those camper suggestions?

Here is Backpacker magazine's recommendation. Note: They say to bury the toilet paper, also. We've walked many trails where toilet paper is laying alongside the trail. Disgusting!

https://www.backpacker.com/skills/be...e-backcountry/

[Psneeld]

Originally Posted by twogypsies

Here is Backpacker magazine's recommendation. Note: They say to bury the toilet paper, also. We've walked many trails where toilet paper is laying alongside the trail. Disgusting!

https://www.backpacker.com/skills/be...e-backcountry/

My guess is 2 different articles for different climate areas.....

Possibly the same reason why some places allow and other don't allow dumping of gray water.

Maybe there is actually science reasons between the 2 "opinion articles" read in Backpacker.

Fortunately..... the OP got the answer (I am assuming because enough people responded with the affirmative).... yes there are reasons to and it is allowed in some places.

[m.elliott63]

The beauty of the plumbing design of our 1998 National Sea Breeze is the kitchen sink drains into the black tank along with the toilet. The shower and bathroom sink are all that is on the grey. If need be, I wouldn't have any qualms about dumping the grey in our rig.

[twogypsies]

Originally Posted by Psneeld

My guess is 2 different articles for different climate areas.....

Here's another Backpacker magazine article for 2008:

https://www.backpacker.com/trips/pac...e-it-with-you/

I can find nothing on your 'spreading it on a rock' method.

[roblaura]

Dump tanks on the ground only in an emergency. Even then, flush the area with a liberal amount of water.

[Yosemite77]

Just to toss another idea out there for people with more than one gray tank, you could always add a valve at your sewer outlet. With that valve closed and the gray valves open, gray water can flow from one tank to the other.
We have a composting toilet, so our black tank sits empty. If our two gray tanks ever get filled up (unlikely), it’s available as a backup.

[Psneeld]

Originally Posted by twogypsies

Here's another Backpacker magazine article for 2008:

https://www.backpacker.com/trips/pac...e-it-with-you/

I can find nothing on your 'spreading it on a rock' method.

Here's an article from 2013...so true I could have read it as long as 20 years ago...but as pointed out so many times, the squeamish are inheriting the earth so more and more rules/germaphobes (not all, but more and more).

https://www.climbing.com/skills/guid...ng-number-two/

"Don’t Smear!

A decade or so ago, the smear method of backcountry pooping was recommended when digging a cathole wasn’t plausible. It was especially recommended in alpine and desert environments, where the harsh, dry, windy weather was thought to speed decomposition. But since the early 2000s, the smear has largely been abandoned by organizations such as Leave No Trace as a preferred method of meadow-muffin disposal. It wasn’t practical to expect people to follow the proper smearing protocol, which required spreading feces into a thin veneer on a rock or the ground. (Think icing on a cake, according to Ben Lawhon, LNT’s education director.) Scientific studies have now shown that it takes about four months for this “icing” to break down.

I could be wrong about Backpaker having the article... but good luck trying to prove I didn't read about it.....

Hopefully back to the main topic now......