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Buried well heads are common on older Medford, Grants Pass, and Ashland properties. Here is how to narrow down where yours is, and how we locate it and the well line without digging up the yard.

On 88% of our jobs, no maps or as-builts exist on site. What that means for your dig, and what actually makes a utility locate difficult.

Eight examples from our 2026 field reports where 811 had been called and utilities were still unmarked, including a gas main in a roadway.

811 was run correctly on a developed apartment site. Verifying the public marks still turned up an unmarked medium-voltage line on an undocumented easement.

A customer was quoted over $20,000 to replace an irrigation system nobody could map. Locating the existing layout turned it into a few small changes.

A new homeowner asked where their septic tank was. A sonde traced it to beneath the recent addition. Why a septic locate belongs before closing, not after.

A homeowner's septic as-built was missing a line, and it ran through the footing of their planned shop. How GPR found it before the concrete was poured.

An electrician needed to core a post-tension slab in an occupied retirement home. How GPR scanning marked the cables, rebar and conduit first.

Forty years of renovations, no single record. How AUUL digitised the as-builts, surveyed the complex, and delivered an editable RTK utility map.

A fencing crew called 811, set posts, and drilled through the private power feed to a shop. What it cost, and what a private locate would have prevented.

811 marks the water utility's main and service up to your meter in Spokane County. The line from the meter to your house, your well line, and your irrigation are not included. Here is what gets marked and what does not.

Marking concerns phone numbers for 118 utility operators across 19 Montana counties including Billings, Missoula, Bozeman, Great Falls, Helena, Kalispell and Butte.

Marking concerns phone numbers for utility operators in Bonner, Boundary and Kootenai counties. Who to call when locate marks are wrong, missing or disturbed.

Marking concerns phone numbers for 491 utility operators across 39 Washington counties. Who to call when locate marks are wrong, missing or disturbed.

Direct marking concerns phone numbers for utility operators in every Oregon county. Who to call when locate marks are wrong, missing or disturbed.

From Tideflats industrial sites to pre-war homes in North End, what we locate in Tacoma that 811 does not, plus GPR slab scanning before you core or cut.

Written for excavators and GCs in Lane and Douglas counties: what a private locate gives you, how we get depths, and the GPS/RTK deliverable you can put in your drawings.

Rogue Valley properties run on irrigation, wells, and septic, and rebuild lots still have the old lines in the ground. What we mark in Southern Oregon that 811 does not.

What to expect when you hire a private locator: what we need from you, how we find buried lines, what the marks mean afterward, and how long it takes.

Calling 811 is free and legally required. Here's what the free locate covers, where costs actually come from, and which lines 811 will never mark.