It all starts with how you approach a promising site.
“The important thing is to zero in on the spot from all possible angles, to make sure you don’t get a false read.” explained Alan Cole. “If there is a tug on your rod at that spot from every angle you hit it, that means there is water underneath.”
Cole, 64, a Stanfordville resident, is a water dowser, a craft that’s been practiced and debated for thousands of years around the world.
Dowsing, also known as divining, is the practice of using a forked stick, rod, or pendulum to locate sources of water or minerals deep underground. Holding one of the forks in each hand, the dowser (nearly every rural county of the United States seems to have at least one) walks back and forth over the area to be tested and waits for the rod to react. If it rotates downward at a certain spot, that indicates there is water below the surface.
“It is amazing to watch a dowser at work,” said Valerie Andrews of Andrews Welldrilling & Pump Service in Pleasant Valley. Well drillers often recommend a dowser to a property owner, Andrews said, “when we are asked to put a well into an iffy area. We have drilled wells that were recommended by dowsers.”
Dowsers have been around since humans started searching for reliable sources of water. An illustration shows the founder of China’s Xia Dynasty, Emperor Yu The Great, probing for water with a divining rod around the year 2070 B.C. You can even find evidence of dowsing in one of the remotest spots on Earth, in the heart of the Sahara Desert, where ancient rock art purportedly shows a dowser.
But generally, the history of dowsing before the 14th century is difficult to track — probably because it was viewed as an occult art that could result in the practitioner being charged with witchcraft. In the Old Testament (Hosea 4:12), dowsing is denounced as a pagan ritual: “My people consult their wooden idol and their diviner’s wand informs them; for a spirit of harlotry has led them astray and they have played the harlot, departing from their God.” The Catholic Church banned dowsing centuries ago — then tried to improve on it when it proved profitable.
Today, more than a few people consider dowsing a pseudoscience. In the magazine Neuroscience in Consciousness, scientists attribute dowsing to the ideomotor effect. A dowsing rod moves without any perceptible action by the user through involuntary muscle movements that are triggered by prior experience or expectation.
None of this fazes Cole, a mild-mannered man who also works as a carpenter and a caretaker for homes. He takes pride in his craft and does not try to force his beliefs on anyone. “A lot of people are skeptical,” he said. “I tell them I have no control over it.”
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about dowsing is that it endures in multiple countries at a time when utilities deploy electromagnetism and other sophisticated technology to find buried objects. “Most of my jobs come from well drillers and plumbing contractors,” said Cole. That’s unsurprising. Contractors do not want to miss a vein when they are drilling 500 feet down.
There are no schools for dowsing — the art is passed on from generation to generation — and most dowsers do not even advertise their services. An elderly farmer in Millbrook, Alfred White of Valley Farm Road, taught Cole how to dowse more than half a century ago.
“Alfred asked me to twig for him. ‘Just try it,’ he said, and I did and found water on our property,” Cole recalled. But there was a hitch: The vein he located was under a proposed driveway. “Water is often in the most inconvenient spot,” Cole said. “So they rerouted the driveway and drilled and found water there.”
After that initial success, Cole dowsed for his high school gym teacher, Fred Ellis, on Tower Hill Road in Millbrook. “Everybody told me, Forget it, there’s no water up on Tower Hill,” he said. “But I found water for him. After that, I was hooked.” He’s been at it for 56 years and counting. “I started when I was 8,” he said proudly.
These days, Cole dowses up to half a dozen times a year, charging $200 for his services. He is quick to point out he is not a geologist “but I do understand how water moves through the shale rock that predominates in Northern Dutchess. That’s critical for being a good dowser.”
Not everyone can dowse (My own attempt was a failure.) “My daughters can’t do it,” said Cole ruefully. “But I’m holding out hope for my grandson. He’s only 5 though. Or maybe my granddaughters will have the touch, but they are 2 years old and 6 months old, so we will need to wait a bit on that.”
When he arrives at a job site, Cole is focused. First, he studies the terrain and the depth of any existing wells. Then he begins walking deliberately back and forth across the land, pausing in deep concentration if he senses a twitch, then moving on with measured steps. “We can also find pipes if there’s water in them,” he said.
“When you sense water, it’s like when you’re fishing and you feel a tug on the line. I can feel that tug in the rod. It bobs like a bobber.”
After spending nearly an hour surveying my property, the rod in his hands suddenly jerked uncontrollably downward. Cole smiled. Eventually he flagged what he said were two large water sources. Now all I have to do is afford a well.
In this way, a mysterious tradition continues one step at a time — in Europe, North Africa, China, and Pine Plains.