Thomas Kwader tells us that proper development removes drill mud (if used in the drilling of the well), clays and silts which tend to plug the screen and adjacent filter pack.
Normally when we think of developing wells, we associate development with improving the well's ability to produce water. Proper development removes drill mud (if used in the drilling of the well), clays and silts which tend to plug the screen and adjacent filter pack.
If these "fines" are not removed, the water will likely be "milky" or "turbid" from these fine particles being suspended in the water. Monitoring wells, installed for environmental sampling of groundwater, do not need to produce large volumes of water; however, underdeveloped wells may adversely affect environmental samples in a number of ways. First, if metals are a site compound of concern, then turbidity can increase the concentration of metals detected since the suspended particles causing the turbidity often contain a wide range of "naturally occurring" metals which may not be associated with the operations of the site. Artificially high levels of metals may result in unnecessary and costly remedial actions at the site.