My brother Les, his son Dustin, and I recently embarked on a treasure hunt.

We didn’t have a map like the Count of Monte Cristo, so there was a certain amount of random digging involved. Not by hand, of course. Les and I have reached the age where “work smarter, not harder” isn’t just a good idea; our weary bones and creaky joints have made it a necessity.

We weren’t searching for silver or gold: the metal we were seeking was cast iron. And we’re talking about a level of digging that required the deployment of Les and Dustin’s excavator.

In lieu of a map, Les and I had to depend on our memories. This was because we were looking for the cast iron sewer pipe and adjoining septic tank that had been installed at our childhood farmhouse in about 1962.

Les and I were potty trained in our farm’s outdoor privy. That type of experience makes you appreciate the comforts of indoor plumbing. You also learn that expediency is paramount when you need to go in the middle of a subzero winter night.

Dustin’s excavator operating skills are extraordinary. He could probably use the excavator to pluck a dime off a hardwood floor without scratching its finish.

Dustin made it look like tremendously good fun to operate the excavator, performing an elegant ballet of scooping, pivoting to the side, dumping the dirt, then plunging back into the trench for another bucketful. It made me wish that I had an excavator to play with.

When excavator’s bucket screeched against something solid, we — by which I mean Dustin — would hop into the trench and use a shovel to see what it was. After several false alarms caused by small stones, we finally found the top of the concrete septic tank. This quickly led to uncovering the iron sewer pipe, which proved to be choked with rust and sludge.

One might wonder why the plumbers installed pipes that they knew would corrode. I’ve learned that it’s because PVC piping hadn’t yet been approved for use in sewers. Those bygone plumbers must have been incredibly muscular. A single section of cast iron sewer pipe weighs approximately as much as a Buick.

As a precaution I asked Scott, our septic service guy, to come out and empty the septic tank. He accomplished this by using a hose that’s connected to a humungous truck-mounted vacuum tank.

Scott is a better man than me. If I owned his service, the truck would be emblazoned with such words as “My business sucks!” He instead uses the much more elegant “Dakota Pumping.”

I told Scott how, many years ago, the basement drain in the farmhouse where my wife and I live had become plugged. Some strenuous plunging unplugged it, but not before I extracted a penny from the drain’s trap.

“That’s how I learned that my wife was going through the change,” I said.

“The oddest thing I’ve pulled from a septic tank is a dead cat,” Scott said. “People need to keep their septic tank’s access ports secured.”

The next step in our sewer repair project was to remove the prehistoric basement floor drain by using a sledgehammer to fracture its encasing concrete. Thankfully, the plumbers who originally installed that drain were stingy and the concrete was thin. It took only a few minutes for Dustin to bust up the concrete while Les and I superintended.

The ancient iron sewer pipe that elbowed its way into the crawlspace and connected to the bathroom’s drainpipes was so corroded that it broke when Dustin gave it a kick. I examined the pipe and saw that “DAHL HDWE” was stenciled on it. Dahl Hardware was a nearby small-town hardware store when I was a kid. It’s nice to know that the plumber had shopped locally.

There was zero doubt that the 64-year-old sewer stack had to be replaced. We — by which I mean Dustin — wormed into the dusty, cramped, cobwebbed crawlspace, and wrestled with the iron pipe until it surrendered. This was followed by installing a new PVC sewer stack and connecting it to the drainpipes. Les and I closely monitored developments as Dustin cut and glued the pipes. We did our bit by handing Dustin assorted parts and tools.

The 130-year-old farmhouse’s septic system is now modernized and fully functional. Sadly, the things that had consumed so much time and effort are either underground or in the crawlspace.

The decaying carcass of our outmoded outhouse slouches at the edge of the farmstead’s grove. Maybe I should restore it as insurance against the unlikely event of a plumbing failure.

Plus, it would be a reminder of what the “good ol’ days” were really like.

— Jerry’s book, “Dear County Agent Guy” can be found at www.workman.com and in bookstores nationwide.