A Psychic Path to Water?

Hydrogeologists say there is a strong chance of hitting groundwater wherever one digs. Dowsers and their supporters say that misses the point.

"You know there's water down there, but you want to hit it within short order, and you don't want to hit haphazardly," said Peter Holden, a Purcellville farmer who is a liaison to the Virginia Association of Soil and Water Conservation Districts. He said dowsers found him plentiful supplies on three properties.

Dowsers said they sometimes do a better, quicker job than the engineers. Talbot "Toby" Warren, 62, of Fauquier County said he discovered a 350-gallon-a-minute source years ago for the Hill School in Middleburg after a hydrogeologist failed. "The pressure blew out of the ground like an oil gush," he said.

Warren, a retired teacher whose work is recommended by Upperville-based Valley Drilling Corp., was asked a few days ago to help find a new residential well in Loudoun after the old one dried up. Recently, he demonstrated his methods in his back yard.

Surface puddles, he said, have no effect on his fresh-cut willow twig, but water flowing through underground pipes create an irresistible tension that pulled it down. When the pull is particularly strong, he said, the twig cracks.

The use of twigs and rods dates to biblical times, dowsers say. Over the centuries, practitioners uttered incantations to empower rods with divine grace to seek water and other hidden substances, from precious metals to lost cats to bad vibes. Lore has it that the term "water witch" derives not from a description of a person but rather from the witch hazel branches preferred by Anglo-Scottish immigrants.

Dowsers themselves debate how to define their practice, said Arvid Johnson, operations manager of the 3,000-member American Society of Dowsers, based in Vermont. But they agree on the need for a clear mind and sharp focus.

"It's kind of like a hammer is to a carpenter. The hammer doesn't build the house; the carpenter does. The rod doesn't find water; the dowser does," said dowser Tom Stewart, 61, of North Carolina, who recently retired as a teacher and started an online business selling his homemade rods.

Stewart, who ships three or four rods a week, said the Internet has exposed dowsing to new demographics. He recently shipped rods to a client in Malaysia and another in Turkey who expressed interest in finding gold. Alternative health practitioners are among his clients.

John Fincham Jr., 72, of Winchester has a penchant for his pendulum, an amethyst quartz stone hanging from a fine chain. By spinning clockwise for yes or counterclockwise for no, the pendulum channels a magnetism of sorts to answer questions that transcend matter, Fincham said. On Cross's property in Clarke County's Berryville one recent day, the pendulum oscillated sharply as Fincham posed questions about water depth and flow.

Cross had called Fincham, who learned the art of dowsing at a school in Arkansas, for a second opinion about where to drill a new well.

"Relax. Don't try to grip 'em. Elbows by your sides," said Fincham, coaching his friend with the 18-inch rods.

But until Cross finds $2,000 to get a driller and permits, the presence of water at this spot would remain, rather like his knack with rods, an enigma.