Winter water?

[thebesticanbe]

I am running a vertical watering nillpes in a 5gal plastic bucket. I will be getting a heater for it but a friend said the steal nipples will ice over and copper ones wont but he cant remember where he got them from. Hi from colorado springs!

 

[Our Roost]

It always interests me each year to get the latest ideas on how to manage efforts of keeping water from freezing. Chicken management and upkeep varies on a different level depending on the climate you are blessed or not so blessed to live in. It is at this point every year that I wish I was wintering in a warmer state! Each state within our country goes thru seasonal changes in different ways and we manage our chicken upkeep and maintenance based on climate changes.
I use a plastic manufactured 55 gallon rain barrel with PVC and pipe nipple waterers and spigots where needed. Mother nature fills the rain barrel with screened water that I filter and add apple cider vinegar to ward off bacteria within. I fill some old porcelain dish pans from the spigots and the convenience all summer long is minimal. When that first frost hits, its time to empty and drain the whole system before it freezes solid. I drain the barrel and the PVC lines completely until the following spring to repeat the process. Fortunately I wired the coop to code with some electrical outlets and inside lighting with safety switch boxes and outlets. Its more for convenience and rarely do I use it to promote heating elements within the coop. I didn't have electric power to the coop for the first few years of raising chickens and we always dreaded changing the water dishes daily! Winter can bring on added maintenance and make life miserable if you don't adapt and adjust to find an easier way.
I love postings with illustrations showing home made contraptions that actually work! I am sometimes amazed at peoples ingenuity to create using the Maguyver method! Anything and everything gets used. My mind is always at work but at my age, I try to simplify in the best way possible. Heated dog dishes come in a few different sizes. The amount of water they hold based on your flock size can be most important to ease your efforts on cold days. Refilling with fresh water can be as much work as keeping it from freezing. The ones I purchased hold a gallon and a half of water which is ample for about 2 days with 15-20 chickens depending on how dehydrated and thirsty they are. Regardless, a trip out to the coop daily is a must but without the headache of frozen water containers.
So, keep those ideas flowing and keep your water clean and unfrozen the best way you can!

 

[COChix]

I am running a vertical watering nillpes in a 5gal plastic bucket. I will be getting a heater for it but a friend said the steal nipples will ice over and copper ones wont but he cant remember where he got them from. Hi from colorado springs!

Sorry I can't help with that. You might try asking in the Colorado thread, there are some folks from the Springs on the board as well. Friendly group and an active board...

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/68894/colorado

 

[thebesticanbe]

Thank you for your help. I will check it out

 

[coop410silkies]

Here is our winter set up....

5 gallon buckets with horizontal nipples, K & H Bucket Heaters. The heaters are submersible or they float, they have a built in thermostat that turns the heater on when it drops below a certain temp and it turns the heater off when it it warm out. The heaters are designed for buckets either metal or plastic. We love this system and are in Colorado, last year was our first year using this system and we had temps of -15 to -18 below and they did not freeze.

My breeder pen set ups are just like this, but the waterers are OUTSIDE the pen, and the birds access the nipple through the wire fence. I use the 250 watt API thermostatically controlled de icers, which seems a bit of an overkill to me, which is why I'm considering going to the heated dogbowls as heat sources for the buckets, if they do well this year. The system you use is the BEST, and it relieves sooo much of the stress of keeping chickens healthy in winter. Somebody really should do a thread on how to make safe electrical outdoor connections when using these watering systems.

 

[coop410silkies]

So, all of your watering systems are in the run, and not in your coop?  How do you set up electric to be weather proof?  Does your 250W deicer have a built in thermostat?

In my smaller coop (4 x 8) the first year with 5 birds, I gave them a flower pot heater for those days on end that never got up to 0*F.  It may have raised the temp a few degrees, and they could have snuggled up to it if they wanted.  Last winter, in 10 x 12, I gave a bit of heat, at night when they were hypothermic.  (depressed appetite, as well as decreased activity level:  standing around with feathers fluffed all day)  In your smaller coop, you will need to be sure that they have plenty of ventilation which is not at comb level.  Also, be sure that when they roost, that they are not too close to the wall.  If their faces are close to the wall when roosting, their exhaled moisture condenses and produces a perfect set up for frost bite when they are close to the wall. You'll also need to be sure that when they are on the roost that their feet can be flat, not curled around a skinny roost pole.  2 x 4 laid on the flat is good.  Do they have a run that they can access in the winter?   "They say" that chickens DON'T need heat in the winter.  For the most part, I'm inclined to agree.  But, when I see my flock eating LESS, and not moving well, IMO, they are NOT doing fine, and will benefit from a few degrees of heat.  Katelyn, have you been to the Maine thread?  You might want to join us over there.  Also, are you going into the winter with a flock as big as you'd like?  An extra body or two might help, but you would also be dealing with introducing birds as they are moving into the most stressfull time of the year.  It would depend on your set up, and if you have a run that is sheltered enough that they will use it in the winter.  I have been using a 5 qt heated dog bowl with a gallon jug of water set in the middle for my smaller flock.  Need to upgrade for larger flock this year.  

I have 3 "larger" coops (8x12 hoop, 14x16 hoop, and a 10x12 old loafing shed style plywood coop). IN two of these I have a 65 gallon rainbarrel set up on a 30" stand, and the water is heated with a thermostatically controlled 250 watt API bucket heater. The wood coop has a GFCI safety outlet and all the water heaters (3 total) are run from a heavy duty (12 gauge) extension cord. The cord connections to the heaters are secured with a "cord connection protector" which is supposed to be water safe, and these make the connections chicken-proof, as well. I mount the cords so that the connections stay OFF the floor. I have waterers with horizontal nipples both inside (one is right beneath the spigot of the rain barrel) the coop and outside the coop. The outside waterer is a 20 gallon plastic trash can set on a stand OUTSIDE the run. It has a horizontal nipple and supplies water through the wire run enclosure to two cocks separated from the flock in the coop. The water is heated with a deicer on a heavy extension cord run through a notch in the closed pop door to the the outlet in the coop.

My other two rainbarrel heaters are run from heavy duty extension cords plugged into GFCI circuits, on the patio and in my shop. One of these is on a stand central to a number of smaller hoop coops supplied with their own heated bucket waterers or flip latch totes. When their waterers need filling, I run a hose from the water barrel spigot to the buckets. The buckets are OUTSIDE the pens, and the chickens have to come out of their little shelters to access the nipples through the fence. This set up will not work well on level terrain, as the water delivery is gravity fed. A small utility pump might work, though.

Most of the cord connections are done with "water proof" connect-locks, and the connections are hung on the fence, off the ground. I have used another type of home made "water safe" connection employing a multi outlet extension inside a bucket, lidded and wrapped in a plastic bag. The Internet net has a number of videos on how to make water proof connections, and it's a good idea to research them.

Electrical is a rather specialized field, and not being an EE, I have trouble making recommendations. Before I started using bucket heaters, I made the light bulb in a cinder block thing, which also works well; it's cheap, doesn't use a lot of electricity, is easy to make, and lasts a long time. If you use white buckets, they light up the night with whatever color bulb you put in, and it looks like a holiday. And you can see immediately if your heater is on or needs a new bulb, or has come unplugged. If you use these with Thermocubes, your water will not over heat.

It got really cold last winter, and some of my Roos' combs got rather severely frost bitten. I used "huddle" boxes in small shelters, and instead of keeping to their small groups, my different groups of birds all piled in together in one box. Just as one large shelter may not keep too few birds warm, a small enclosure may make too many birds too warm and moist. This box that everyone piled into could be seen steaming, and snow never stuck to it, even though it had a lot of ventilation. Warm and moist, and when they came out, their combs froze. Word to the wise: match the coop size to the number of birds.

Yes, my birds are starting to look a little unhappy, and they are staying in the coop. Some don't seem to mind the snow and the cold at all, but I think my daily visit actually cheers them up, especially when I bring them scrambled eggs and scratch soaked in milk. I think they forget to eat when I don't visit. Even/especially as chicks, they would start eating the moment they saw me.

This was lengthy and I apologize. I should have taken pictures. Hope I answered some of your questions.

 

[coop410silkies]

  It always interests me each year to get the latest ideas on how to manage efforts of keeping water from freezing. Chicken management and upkeep varies on a different level depending on the climate you are blessed or not so blessed to live in. It is at this point every year that I wish I was wintering in a warmer state! Each state within our country goes thru seasonal changes in different ways and we manage our chicken upkeep and maintenance based on climate changes.
  I use a plastic manufactured 55 gallon rain barrel with PVC and pipe nipple waterers and spigots where needed. Mother nature fills the rain barrel with screened water that I filter and add apple cider vinegar to ward off bacteria within. I fill some old porcelain dish pans from the spigots and the convenience all summer long is minimal. When that first frost hits, its time to empty and drain the whole system before it freezes solid. I drain the barrel and the PVC lines completely until the following spring to repeat the process. Fortunately I wired the coop to code with some electrical outlets and inside lighting with safety switch boxes and outlets. Its more for convenience and rarely do I use it to promote heating elements within the coop. I didn't have electric power to the coop for the first few years of raising chickens and we always dreaded changing the water dishes daily! Winter can bring on added maintenance and make life miserable if you don't adapt and adjust to find an easier way.
  I love postings with illustrations  showing home made contraptions that actually work! I am sometimes amazed at peoples ingenuity to create using the Maguyver method! Anything and everything gets used. My mind is always at work but at my age, I try to simplify in the best way possible. Heated dog dishes come in a few different sizes. The amount of water they hold based on your flock size can be most important to ease your efforts on cold days. Refilling with fresh water can be as much work as keeping it from freezing. The ones I purchased hold a gallon and a half of water which is ample for about 2 days with 15-20 chickens depending on how dehydrated and thirsty they are. Regardless, a trip out to the coop daily is a must but without the headache of frozen water containers.
  So, keep those ideas flowing and keep your water clean and unfrozen the best way you can! e

I have two 55 gallon polyethylene food grade barrels, some bulkhead fittings, some faucets, a 250 watt bucket heater, and some horizontal nipples - and I am thinking of making a thermostatically regulated 55 gallon waterer that will serve year round. What do you think? How about wrapping the barrel in some kind of a Mylar enhanced blanket/covering so that it stays warmer in winter and cooler in summer and is resistant to algal growth?

Why not run water to a free standing hose outlet by your coop (providing you can trench the pipe below frostline.) There ARE special fixtures for this to keep the outlet from freezing and bursting.

Here is something I did last winter when it got below zero. My Silkies were in a somewhat exposed, less than optimal housing; they didn't seem committed to sleeping INSIDE their Dogloo, and I grew weary of stuffing and locking them in to said quarters every night. And I worried about them. So one night I filled a one gallon milk jug with hot water, capped it, and put it in the igloo with them. To my surprise, the milk jug NEVER froze, not even on the coldest sub-zero nights. This is the power of a number of birds in a small enclosure. Ultimately, I don't believe it did much good to put the jug of hot water in, because as the water got colder, it maybe acted more as a heat sink than as a heat provider. In any event, I quit worrying about the Silkies getting cold.

End of More thoughts on a watery subject. Be safe and KISS.

BTW, it is illegal in Colorado to catch and/or store rainwater.

 

[Our Roost]

Geesh! Hard to believe you cannot collect rain water in a barrel to water plants, gardens and use for whatever. That's a real deterrent. I use mine almost all year round. I wrapped Pvc lines and never thought rain barrel would freeze with that much water in it, But it froze solid! We had miniature horses at that time and the horse trough had a floating heating element to keep water from freezing. Something of this nature could be used with water barrel if thought out right. I also purchased heated electrical lines and strung the length of PVC along with insulated pipe wrap to keep water in pipes from freezing. Well,- the water exposed from the nipplers still froze! Any open water exposed to the elements stand a chance of freezing. So, the adventure can be difficult if not thought out thoroughly. A 2 gallon heated dog dish bucket has potential. I think nipplers could be threaded and tapped in the side of bucket. The side wall of the bucket is pretty thick. There are a variety of nipplers offered to suit the purpose. Good luck.

 

[susanpollan]

Do any of you have a problem with the chickens pecking the cords or anything? I was thinking of using heat tape on my watered but was afraid they might peck it

 

[bruceha2000]

Geesh! Hard to believe you cannot collect rain water in a barrel to water plants, gardens and use for whatever. That's a real deterrent.

Colorado has some "interesting" water rights laws. It is a LOT murky to me (never lived in CO) but I think generally speaking, you can't take rain water off your roof and use it because you are "stealing" it from the rightful owner - someone who has a well who knows where (and has been using it who knows how long but before 'your house' was built) that would be fed by that rainwater if you hadn't pilfered it.

http://www.waterinfo.org/rights.html