When I worked for a rural electric cooperative many years ago in northeast Colorado, we had a customer with a strange problem. His cattle would not drink from their water tank. We went to investigate, and discovered that the voltage between the water tank and an earth ground was several volts. We pulled the meter for that farmstead, but the voltage remained. Finally, I asked the linemen to shut off the power to the mile of overhead line that supplied power to that farm. No effect; the voltage remained. By this time we were puzzled. The nearest electrical service was at least one mile away, but we decided to shut off power to that farm as a test. When we did, the voltage on the stock tank went to zero! Further tests showed that the submersible well pump at the other farm had a winding shorted to ground. When this pump was replaced, the problem was resolved. Soil conductivity was poor in sandy soil, but there was an extensive groundwater aquifer near the surface. We concluded that the stray current from the defective motor flowed from its metallic well casing through the ground water to the well casing next to the stock tank. The well casing was electrically connected to the stock tank by metallic plumbing.