Ameraucana thread for posting pictures and discussing our birds

[THeelChickinKY]

If you want to spend money instead of time, haha, check out Chicken Fountain. We love ours - it hooks to your garden hose so it's automatic. Not too pricey, either.

 

[Sylvester017]

yes ma'am, those are coke bottles with the nipples in the cap. I put them in one of the shampoo holder thingies you can stick on the shower wall, LOL. No they don't leak, but I actually didn't like them much because there was no air inlet, I poked a hole in the bottom of the bottle and would put my finger over it while I was filling it up, they seemed to work better after that.

Mine took to the nipples in about 4 or 5 minutes. I know I don't have to tell you this, but all it takes is ONE getting it, then the others will come over to see what's up, LOL

I picked up an empty plastic food grade barrel yesterday, I'll be working on my nipple watering systme in the coop and run later in the week

Nipple waterers need a hole at the top so the water flows out the bottom of the valves when the birds tap to get a drink. My DH had the top air valve closed off of our Brite Tap Rubbermaid nipple waterers for 1/2 a day before I noticed he didn't flip them open! Poor birdies weren't getting any water to drink! Nipple waterers are easy to train chicks because they curiously peck at EVERYTHING and quickly catch on to where water comes from! My old hens were a different generation to train from bowl water to nipple waterers. I took my smartest little pistol of a Silkie and showed her how to use the valves by tapping them over and over several times during the day and she caught on within an hour how to use them. The other older hens took longer but I kept going out to the waterers tapping the valves 20x a day until the last hen figured how to get a good drink 8 DAYS later! The trick to getting old hens accustomed to the new waterers is to remove all the old water bowls completely. Brite Tap people were very patient to advise me how to transition the old hens to nipple valves.

 

[TattooedMama]

You can make your own using a five gallon bucket. That would hold about four nipples. Like I said, try to rig it up to stay fairly stationary instead of twisting on a rope or chain. The buckets are easier to deal with as far as changing the water, cleaning etc., but you can also make one using pvc piping. Check this one out:

http://www.qcsupply.com/hanging-tube-waterer.html

That would be my hiope as well as I will not have anything stable to hang it from. I would imagine it propped in some way would work much better. The one in the photo I have seen something like this with a 5 gallon bucket attached to the other end of the house elevated. This way the water moved down by gravity into the PVC waterer. I think I saw this in conjunction with rabbit waterers but it's all the same idea

 

[Sylvester017]

You can make your own using a five gallon bucket. That would hold about four nipples. Like I said, try to rig it up to stay fairly stationary instead of twisting on a rope or chain. The buckets are easier to deal with as far as changing the water, cleaning etc., but you can also make one using pvc piping. Check this one out:

http://www.qcsupply.com/hanging-tube-waterer.html

Quote:
Originally Posted by TattooedMama

That would be my hiope as well as I will not have anything stable to hang it from. I would imagine it propped in some way would work much better. The one in the photo I have seen something like this with a 5 gallon bucket attached to the other end of the house elevated. This way the water moved down by gravity into the PVC waterer. I think I saw this in conjunction with rabbit waterers but it's all the same idea

There are so many neat ways to set up nipple valve waterers.

We are construction challenged and wanted to order something pre-done and portable with flexibility to either mount or hang. We only have 4 hens soon to be 5. Perhaps there are cheaper labor-intensive time-consuming ways to set up waterers but this was so easy we got 3 of them and can easily move them around the yard or a coop. No tap water or hoses to keep connected all the time. And the insulated jugs keep the water cool for days and days. We use filtered water rather than chlorine tap and add ice cubes in hot weather and the jugs stay algae free and easy to clean 1 or 2 times a month. We found the Brite Tap Rubbermaid combo pkgs on the following: https://www.chickenwaterer.com/

We also had older hens that never saw nipple waterers before and Mark at chickenwaterers advised very patiently how to transition our old girls to use new waterers.

 

[MrsBachbach]

There are so many neat ways to set up nipple valve waterers. 

We are construction challenged and wanted to order something pre-done and portable with flexibility to either mount or hang.  We only have 4 hens soon to be 5.  Perhaps there are cheaper labor-intensive time-consuming ways to set up waterers but this was so easy we got 3 of them and can easily move them around the yard or a coop.  No tap water or hoses to keep connected all the time. And the insulated jugs keep the water cool for days and days.  We use filtered water rather than chlorine tap and add ice cubes in hot weather and the jugs stay algae free and easy to clean 1 or 2 times a month.  We found the Brite Tap Rubbermaid combo pkgs on the following: https://www.chickenwaterer.com/

We also had older hens that never saw nipple waterers before and Mark at chickenwaterers advised very patiently how to transition our old girls to use new waterers.

Pretty neat. People making all kind of money coming up with ideas for these nipple waterers!

One problem I have with them is height. What is the ideal height for the nipples? I heard eye level. What do you do when you have a range of size in your flock? One pen has a large rooster, much taller than the hens. Adjust it for him and it's too high for the hens. Adjust for hens and it would be below head level for him. Same with chicks if you have some of a different age than others.

 

[PapaChaz]

Pretty neat. People making all kind of money coming up with ideas for these nipple waterers!

One problem I have with them is height. What is the ideal height for the nipples? I heard eye level. What do you do when you have a range of size in your flock? One pen has a large rooster, much taller than the hens. Adjust it for him and it's too high for the hens. Adjust for hens and it would be below head level for him. Same with chicks if you have some of a different age than others.

I've always thought to put them at the average height of their backs. Of course if you have chicks you'd need something lower for them, but the rooster in the above scenario can and will bend down to get a drink. I personally always seemed to have better luck making them stretch for it, they have to tilt their heads back to swallow it anyway

 

[Sylvester017]

Pretty neat. People making all kind of money coming up with ideas for these nipple waterers!

One problem I have with them is height. What is the ideal height for the nipples? I heard eye level. What do you do when you have a range of size in your flock? One pen has a large rooster, much taller than the hens. Adjust it for him and it's too high for the hens. Adjust for hens and it would be below head level for him. Same with chicks if you have some of a different age than others.

This is why I bought 3 Brite Tap jugs. I have them set at different heights next to each other outside. The Silkies use the lowest one and the Ameraucanas use the tallest one. Apparently when chickens drink water they tilt their heads back to swallow so the windpipe closes in their mouth when they drink. That's why we set the Brite Taps at different heights so when the chicken stretches up to drink it closes their windpipe. However we find the Ameraucanas will drink from any of the jugs but the Silkies prefer the shortest one - but they still have to stretch to reach and hit the valves. The chore of keeping after chicken water to keep it free of wild bird poops and kicked grass has been eliminated since getting the cleaner Brite Taps. We almost got a bucket with 5 nipple valves coming out all around the sides of the bucket but it would only work if it was hung up and we like to set our jugs in a row on different cinder blocks and paver stones outside. Everyone has a unique situation for water needs and the Brite Tap was our easiest cleanest solution.

 

[potagergirl]

Pretty neat. People making all kind of money coming up with ideas for these nipple waterers!

One problem I have with them is height. What is the ideal height for the nipples? I heard eye level. What do you do when you have a range of size in your flock? One pen has a large rooster, much taller than the hens. Adjust it for him and it's too high for the hens. Adjust for hens and it would be below head level for him. Same with chicks if you have some of a different age than others.

i think I would get a couple of the side mount water nipples and place them higher on the bucket. Just make sure your water level stays above the nipple line.

 

[jessicaagross]

I have the side nipples, and I really like them, they leak less than the regular nipples. Although I do think it's a bit harder for them to drink from than the regular nipples, but only marginally. I have a 50 gallon rubbermade trash can that I put 5 side nipples in for my flock of 50 birds. I sized it right between smaller chickens and turkey beak height. But I do think eye height would work better, so I'll be making a new stand for it sometime this years. It's awesome, they always have clean water, and I only have to refill it every 3-4 weeks during winter or 2-3 weeks during summer.

 

[Reyvaughn]

I want to set up a freeze-free auto waterer system. I found a set up I liked and thought would be easy, but I lost the link.

As for actual birds... Here I am 3.5yrs into wheatens and I feel like I am still just starting out. I started with birds with single beard gene issues. I didn't even realize it at first. I added a new line and lost color and egg color. I am now fighting with ticking. My first roo had a single beard gene, so I sold him off to a EE breeder. I bought a bird from Wayne Meredith's breeding and he took my first roo's place. His tail was to high set and he had to much tail fluff, so last year I culled him. I kept a cockerel from last year's breeding who is still growing out. I hatched eggs from eBay and the rooster from that hatch has a weird comb and is being culled. My other roos is my first roo's son and has a single beard and... he's one of those white crop-outs. Yes, I know, you all tell everyone to cull them. I decided I wanted to see what he'd throw. He has a nice tail set and no extra fluff. He also has the egg color genes I want put back into my flock. If I hatch weird birds, they'll be nice EEs for someone else! In the mean time, I have 4 chicks from unknown lineage growing out, and I am looking to buy either a new rooster or many hatching eggs.

What's funny is I actually got out of these birds because of the lack of breeders of quality birds, the lack of availability of birds from quality breeders and the EE/Ameraucana drama. I must be a glutton for punishment! Or, I really like my birds.