Coffee's ready...

[karl E lutz]

Good morning chicken wranglers,
I forgot about the welder trick.It has been a long time since we have had a freeze that hard.We went out this morning and doubled up on the heaters in the 110 gallon trough.
I really don't know if the boy cause d the freeze up by not keeping watch on the tank well enough or if there was a power outage or some thing.
Anyway the heater was frozen to the side of the tank and the water level HAD fallen as the cattle drank during the day so now we HAVE 2 HEATERS IN THE TANK TO KEEP IT THAWED.
GOD BLESS!

 

[quercus21]

Morning people,
Every one in a while there would be a house fire from people thawing out their frozen pipes. This week has been cold enough to do it. Nothing like the old day ( I sound like an old fat) when the temps dip to minus teens with the highs were in the single digits. We had a policy, 15 degs and above you came to work.

So far the water is just getting a small flimsy crust in tray. Nothing that stops the birds.

We are finally going for photovoltaic. They say it should take care of 109% of our needs. It's a small system 5k. We'll be switching over and using on demand electric hot water to supplement our solar thermal. At this point, we use around 300 gallons of oil per year.

Starting to think about what veggies to start indoors. Tiss the season.

Enjoy your day and be safe

 

[ParadiseFoundFarm]

Karl:
You should look into Premire 1 fencing. It has saved my birds from everything and given me peace of mind. The first time you hear a canine hit the fence and run screaming off into the woods to tell the rest that "free chicken dinner" is now surrounded by a laser force field will set your heart aflutter.

 

[Gargoyle]

and using on demand electric hot water to supplement our solar thermal. At this point, we use around 300 gallons of oil per year.

We wanted to switch to on demand hot water, but we're on a well; too many minerals and iron in our water, it would clog up the on demand system. They are more sensitive to build-up in the pipes than standard hot water heaters.

 

[quercus21]

We wanted to switch to on demand hot water, but we're on a well; too many minerals and iron in our water, it would clog up the on demand system. They are more sensitive to build-up in the pipes than standard hot water heaters.

We have the same problem here with minerals (calcium and iron) . We treat it with a water softener. Personally, I can't drink it unless it is boiled first, but then I can't treat municipal water either. I talked with numerous local plumbers and they think there shouldn't be a problem. We'll see.....

 

[karl E lutz]

Good morning chicken wranglers,
Sounds cool gargoyle I'd like to see it work.
Iron in my water too.Well has a lot of rust in our area.We use a softener that removes a lot of it but it still looks yellow when it comes out.
The garden leaves are always rusty when we are watering a lot.we cannot use an osmosis system because the water has too much iron.
Water water everywhere and all of it is colored!
Well lets all have a good weekend.It is going to be raining ice tomorrow and then in the 60's on Monday
! what a weird forecast!
God Bless!

 

[Gargoyle]

Wow, I just spotted that my coop got CC-POW this morning.
Linked from the scroll at the top of the BYC home page.

As to weather, it was below zero a week ago (-20 C), it hit 63 yesterday (+13 or +14C) and might snow today.
I took the chooks to the garden for a little while, then it started to rain. Their run is fully covered, they've never been in rain before, they were thoroughly confused, huddled up next to their little wagon looking at me, waiting for me to take them back home. When they got home, four of them just stood around preening themselves and trying to figure out what happened, the fifth one just went to work eating. Nothing bothers her.

 

[oesdog]

Dorothy just died in my arms
She was ill for a while. I am a bit sad darn she was a lovely wee PR hen.
She has survived IB in the past which left her weak to this awful cold wet weather weve had for ages.
Oes

 

[rngrbill]

Condolences.

 

[karl E lutz]

My deep sympathies Oes.