Recent content by KPhomestead

  1. KPhomestead

    Hens growing too slow?

    Quote: I am currently building the new nesting boxes, there are 8 nesting slots. The coop has two pens for a total of somewhere around 200-300 sq ft, so its plenty of room for the 20 or so hens and 3 roosters. All of these chickens were hatched in early October. The roosters all seem to be...
  2. KPhomestead

    Hens growing too slow?

    Thanks for the responses. What I am kind of wondering about is comb development on hens? At what age do they start growing a decent sized comb? I know they probably wouldn't be as large as those on my roosters, but the hens don't seem to have much of a comb at all. As far as the start of laying...
  3. KPhomestead

    Hens growing too slow?

    I have about 20 hens that are around 21 weeks old. They are a number of different breeds: RIR, Barred Rocks, and a couple other breeds that I cant determine for sure, but all brown egg layers. At this age I would think they are getting near ready to start laying, but as far as development they...
  4. KPhomestead

    Freezing Nipple Drinkers

    I have never had any problems with my thread type nipples "striping out" during freezing weather. I haven't had the water in my pipes freeze solid though, which I'm sure is what could cause this to happen. My experience it that if kept properly heated and insulated the pvc pipes rarely will...
  5. KPhomestead

    Winterizing Nipple Waterers? UPDATE Really? No One Knows?

    My system uses a 1500 watt stock tank heater for the 40 gal water tank and I have heat tape run along the bottom of the pvc near the nipples themselves. Although I wrapped the pipes in foam insulation and duct tape to keep it from getting destroyed, the nipples do freeze if it gets kinda cold...
  6. KPhomestead

    New guy here

    To keep the nipples from freezing, along with the rest of the water lines I installed heat tape to the bottom of the pipes, just to the rear of the nipples. That along with some insulation should keep everything liquid. If the water inside the pipes doesn't freeze then I don't think the nipples...
  7. KPhomestead

    My chicken automatic waterer idea

    Flowing water freezes at a lower temp than standing water. So that means you might have a little leeway by keeping the water moving if it just dips below freezing, say down to 20F at night or so. My plan was to use a low flow 100-200 gph. fountain pump to recirculate the water from the tank...
  8. KPhomestead

    My chicken automatic waterer idea

    I have a similar system, I used a large 40ish gal. rubbermade tote and vertical nipples. It gets cold here so I used heat tape on the pvc pipe and a extra stock tank heater in the tank to keep everything liquid. I had thought of using a small recirc. pump to keep the lines from freezing, but...
  9. KPhomestead

    New guy here

    Hi everybody, Ive been lurking around this site for a while so I figured I might as well sign up. I have a little bit of experience with chickens, but am by not means an expert, so hopefully I can learn some more here. I raised quite a few layers when I was younger, 25-30 or so at any given...
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