California - Northern

[jenniferlamar70]

We turned our solar on just yesterday at my hardware store.  Kind of a no brainer for me.  Payback is in 3.5 years and free power for more than the next 20 years after that. We bought our system outright, no lease.  I think that is the way to go for sure if you can swing it financially.  We borrowed the money for the solar which was added to a huge refinance of our other debt.   Kern

I wish we could afford to pay for it outright but it's just not possible for us. Integrity has its own financing and they don't take your tax break. It's probably the best option for us. Most of our savings has gone into the house lol. We have actually been thinking about refinancing some cash fixing this place up and selling it. It's become such a big project. It would be nice to buy something with less work.

 

[h2oratt]

That is really cool @caychris. My Pita Pinta hen has become the peacemaker of the flock. Last week I let out the broody & chicks with the flock, and one of my big Orpington cockerels started fighting with the broody.  They were really going at it, flying up & kicking each other. So the Pita Pinta ran over to them & pushed between them.  The cockerel immediately walked away and the mama hen crouched down & put her head under the Pita Pinta's chest. I was so impressed with the Pita Pinta hen. I have seen her break up play-fights between the cockerels too.

Wow that's really nice

 

[Sylvester017]

Yeah my husband and I had talked about that but we just found out we are going to need a new pump for our well. The people who owned the house before us added on but didn't adult the output of the well for a house twice as big as it was. Now we have a 1000 dollar electric bill every month during the summer and a older then time air conditioner that is so old it shouldn't even be running still. We knew this when we bought it. We had to make do with what we could afford so we bought it as a fixer upper. We just didn't realize the effect it would have on our electric bill.

Point being it would cost to much to leave a mister running full time. That's why I go out and do it myself several times a day.

Sometimes $15 can be too much to spend if you don't have it but that's about all an Orbit Mistand or Arctic Cool mister on a stand will run at Home Depot or Lowe's and the mist comes out of the two end nozzles so very fine that it really hardly uses water and you can adjust the faucet pressure for the hose that feeds the mister. It really is very very minimal water use and you don't have to run outside to water down the chickens every hour on the hour! My 4 hens will stand under the very very fine misty spray that comes out of the nozzle and adjust themselves how close they want to be to the mist. I stand the mister in its base under the shade of a pop-up canopy all day. I run the mister from about 10 a.m. until 6 p.m. every day and only noticed about $1 to $1.50 additional on my summer water bill.

 

[jenniferlamar70]

Sometimes $15 can be too much to spend if you don't have it but that's about all an Orbit Mistand or Arctic Cool mister on a stand will run at Home Depot or Lowe's and the mist comes out of the two end nozzles so very fine that it really hardly uses water and you can adjust the faucet pressure for the hose that feeds the mister.  It really is very very minimal water use and you don't have to run outside to water down the chickens every hour on the hour!  My 4 hens will stand under the very very fine misty spray that comes out of the nozzle and adjust themselves how close they want to be to the mist.  I stand the mister in its base under the shade of a pop-up canopy all day.  I run the mister from about 10 a.m. until 6 p.m. every day and only noticed about $1 to $1.50 additional on my summer water bill.

Yeah we are on a well and our pump is messed up. We don't have a water bill. But if we keep the misters running it will make our well pump run all day. It cost us quite a bit to have it running that long. It's kind of like if someone got in the shower and never turned it off for the whole day..

 

[Sylvester017]

Yeah we are on a well and our pump is messed up. We don't have a water bill. But if we keep the misters running it will make our well pump run all day. It cost us quite a bit to have it running that long. It's kind of like if someone got in the shower and never turned it off for the whole day..

Ouch! That's tough! You probably do everything you can to conserve water then? I used to leave out pans of water for some of the chickens to stand in but they and the wild birds would poop in the water and then turn around and drink the filthy water so I stopped doing that. I only use the Brite Tap nipple valve waterers now so nothing will poop in the clean drinking water any more. If you set up a mister line tube how did you plan to deliver the well water to the hose lines - you would still have to run the pump, no? Such a dilemma. I hope someone with expertise can help advise.

 

[Showjumperstar]

Yeah we are on a well and our pump is messed up. We don't have a water bill. But if we keep the misters running it will make our well pump run all day. It cost us quite a bit to have it running that long. It's kind of like if someone got in the shower and never turned it off for the whole day..

Something that I found to be quite useful is taking gallon milk jugs and filling them about 3/4ths with water and freezing them. Then I put them in the shade of the coop, inside the coop, and then one other one in another shady spot so the birdies have places to go. I also freeze food in ice trays and spread it out during the mid afternoon hours when it's that uncomfortable, sticky heat. I have a mist system too, but the birds enjoy the treats and I have noticed a difference in the coop's temperature with the milk jug in there. Depending on your waterers too for them, and if you don't have room for milk jugs in your freezer, maybe taking frozen water bottles and putting them in the waterer to make ice water for them to drink. Hopefully some of my rambling helps! This heat really sucks!

 

[Chickenluver106]

Does anybody know wher I can get free wooden crate pallets around Santa Cruz?

 

[h2oratt]

Does anybody know wher I can get free wooden crate pallets around Santa Cruz?

No but have you seen the awesome coops some people @Sally sunshine make out of them?? I asked my husband where to get them. He said they are hard to get free.

 

[h2oratt]

Ouch!  That's tough!  You probably do everything you can to conserve water then?  I used to leave out pans of water for some of the chickens to stand in but they and the wild birds would poop in the water and then turn around and drink the filthy water so I stopped doing that.  I only use the Brite Tap nipple valve waterers now so nothing will poop in the clean drinking water any more.  If you set up a mister line tube how did you plan to deliver the well water to the hose lines - you would still have to run the pump, no?  Such a dilemma.  I hope someone with expertise can help advise.

I was thinking about trying those waterers. They look nice. I guess you must like them

 

[caychris]

I have used nipple waterers before and still do on occasion but when its really hot I like to give them standing water so they can drink their fill easily. I started doing this after one day watching 4 or 5 birds constantly working the nipples one after the other trying to get enough water in between panting. Standing water will get dirty and it doesnt seem to matter to the chickens if there is clean water just inches away silly birds even drink from the puddle when im changing the water dish while there is nice clean cool water to be had right next to it. I put out ice bottles for them too

I made a bucket air conditioner too that I have put into the coop before as well.

I do put out some cool foot bath tubs with only about 2 inches of water and ice bottles in it when its really hot but not everyone uses them and like they said the water gets filthy fast.

Neal uses number 10 cans as standing water containers which seems to work well because the water stays cleaner. No standing in those. Im thinking of getting some. I have a couple of 2 gallon wide buckets that I use and they usually keep those clean for some reason but I have a third pen now and cant find another one so I think the can idea is probably better.

Im going to try the cup waterer thing in the newer coop im building.