Brooder water bottles

[Sherol]

My chicks are not set to arrive until mid August. Have been busy, when not raining here in Texas, working on their coop. I will put the chicks in my large garden bathtub covered with a lot of protective plastic.. lol .. until they can go out in the coop. Hopefully here it will be in 4-5 weeks. I really appreciate this forum and all the creative people out there as I have seen a lot of ideas and pictures. Because I will not be around to constantly change out water dishes, I wanted to use the soda bottles with the nipples in the brooder. With a tub I had no way to attach such a waterer to the sides. From what I have read the chicks grow fast and so I also wanted something that was adjustable.

What I came up with is attaching the bottles to a cat scratching post that the furballs never use and rubber banding the Coke bottles to it. Both bottles have water in them in the photo and one heavy duty band kept them in place. I am going to get more bands and use two for each bottle so they are tight up against the pole and I can position each independently. As it is here they have to be opposite each other. The possibility of a band breaking also makes having a backup band in place will ensure the water stays there until the problem can be resolved. The single band did show the idea will work though. I can adjust the height up as they grow and can add a lot of protective material to protect it. If it gets trashed the cats actually will not miss it. Something similar could easily be created with a 4x4 post and some sort of base or legs.

 

[curious chickee]

Looks good, my only concern would be if the rubber and breaks, one of the chicks might try to eat it thinking it is a worm. Maybe you could use bungee cords instead (they are larger so chicks couldn't swallow)

 

[new user]

Simple yet effective.


Like mentioned above, I would get rid of the rubber bands, and mount it with something better. Heck hose clamps would work