Idaho well logs

What a well log actually is

A well log — formally a Well Driller's Report — is the record a licensed driller files with the Idaho Department of Water Resources after constructing a well. It is not a marketing document or an inspection. It is what one driller wrote down on one day about one hole in the ground, and that is both its value and its limit.

What is on one

• Total depth — how far down they drilled, in feet. The single biggest driver of what a well costs, because drilling is quoted per foot.
• Static water level — how far below the surface water stood once the well was finished. This decides what pump you need and what it costs to run.
• Production rate — what the driller measured the well yielding, in gallons per minute, on the day they tested it.
• Casing diameter and depth — the pipe lining the hole, and how far down it runs.
• Construction date and well use — when it was drilled and what it was drilled for: domestic, irrigation, stock, monitoring.
• The formations drilled through — sand, gravel, clay, basalt. This only exists on the scanned original, never as a searchable field, and it is the part a driller will most want to see.

Where to get one

Two routes, and they answer different questions. Search here when you have anaddress or a point on a map and want everything nearby — which is the situation almost everyone is in when they are looking at a property. UseIDWR's own searchwhen you already have a well tag number or a township-range-section and want that one record from the source.

Either way the scanned driller's report is attached. We link to it rather than reproduce it, because IDWR's copy is the original and ours would only go stale.

Why so many fields are blank

This is the part that surprises people. A well log is only as complete as the driller made it, and plenty are not complete at all.

• 68.1% report a total depth. Roughly one in three records does not, which is why every statistic on this site is published with the number of records behind it rather than on its own.
• Records are only reliably complete from July 1987 onward. The database holds reports as old as 1912, but a well drilled before the late eighties may have no filed report at all. An empty search result is not proof there is no well.
• A reported water level of zero is ambiguous. It can mean water at the surface, or that nobody wrote a number down. We exclude zeros and tell you how many we excluded, because treating them as real moved one county's median from 12 ft to 29 ft.

How accurately is a well located?

Less accurately than a map pin suggests, and it matters when you are judging how close a record is to your parcel. Of 208,243 records:

• 22.9% have a surveyed or GPS location.
• 59% were recorded as a quarter-quarter section — a 40-acre block — so the real well could sit up to roughly 900 feet from where it plots.

That is also why map markers stack: wells recorded by section share a single centre point. We label every row with how it was located, so you know which distances to lean on.

Reading a log without fooling yourself

A well log tells you what one driller found at one spot on one day. It does not tell you what your parcel will produce, and it does not tell you what that same well does today — water levels move seasonally and over decades, and yield depends on how a well has been pumped and maintained. Read a set of nearby logs as a range and a budget, then get a licensed driller to tell you what they expect here.

Well logs by county

Each county page carries the measured depth range, depth to water, yield and typical drilling cost for that county, computed from its own records — retrieved 2026-09-29.

Median depth is calculated only from records that reported one. Counties showing "not reported" have too few to state a median honestly.

Common questions

What is an Idaho well log?

A well log - formally a Well Driller's Report - is the record a licensed driller must file with the Idaho Department of Water Resources after constructing a well. It states how deep the well was drilled, where water stood when it was finished, what the driller measured it producing, how it was cased, and the formations drilled through.

How do I find the well log for a property?

Search the address or drop a pin on the map and WellDepth returns every well on record nearby, each with a link to its scanned original. IDWR's own Well Construction Search works too, and accepts an address, a well tag number, or a township-range-section.

Are Idaho well logs free?

Yes. They are public records. Searching them here is free and needs no account, and IDWR publishes the scanned originals at no charge.

How far back do Idaho well logs go?

Records in the database run from 1912 to 2026, but they are only reliably complete from July 1987 onward. A well drilled before then may have no filed report at all, so an empty result is not evidence that no well exists.

Why is the depth or water level missing on some logs?

Because the driller did not record it. 68.1% of Idaho records report a total depth, so roughly one in three does not. Every figure on this site states how many records it was calculated from, for exactly this reason.

Does a well log tell me what a well will produce today?

No. It is a snapshot taken when the well was built, sometimes decades ago. Water levels move seasonally and over years, and yield changes with how the well is pumped and maintained. Only a current test tells you what a well does now.

Source

Idaho Department of Water Resources well construction records, retrieved 2026-09-29. IDWR publishes these as public records; we index them so an address is enough to find them, and link to the scanned original for every row.