cups or (straight) nipples?

[Doublete]

I defer to your experience, but what happened with the cups that you dislike them so much?

My chickens couldn’t learn to use them and they got ridiculously dirty which defeated my purpose which was clean water

 

[gtaus]

My chickens couldn’t learn to use [cups] and they got ridiculously dirty which defeated my purpose which was clean water

Understand. Dirty water is no good. Interesting that some people love the cups, and others don't.

 

[aart]

I do not like the Vertical Nipples, they make a mess and you can't set the container down without yet more leakage or damaging the nipples. But they are easier for chicks to use than the Horizontal Nipples. Putting a shallow dish underneath, filled with gravel to catch the drips yet still give good footing for the chicks, works pretty well fro the few that I've seen use it. the 'drip dish' will need to be cleaned daily tho.

Have tried the trigger cups too, just as hard to learn to use as the HN's and can gather debris. Tho cups can be removed to clean but might need fiddling with to make them easy to remove.

I use a conventional open chick waterer in brooder but also have and HN waterer. At about 2 weeks I start to remove the open waterer for most the day. Some chicks pick up on the HN's fast, others not so much, can take a couple weeks until they all are using them effectively enough to remove the open waterer completely.

I stick with HN's because they are best for winter watering.

 

[FlyWheel]

@gtaus : I'm expecting four sexed females sometime this week, see sig (Clover zoning laws limit me to four, no roos}.
So much for "Chicken Math"

 

[Criticalicious]

Use the standard chick waterer or the quail one from TSC for the first week or two to ensure everybody gets plenty of water. (cost $4 at TSC) Use the horizontal nipples on a small bucket (you can get quart paint buckets with a lid at Lowes for a few bucks) alongside it and once you're sure everyone is drinking from the HN take away the other one. I've used the vertical ones but they dripped so much it was annoying to clean.

 

[FlyWheel]

The bottom of the brooder will be granulated PDZ ("sand"). so I'm not too worried about dripping. I couldn't find horiz. nipples (other than the cup kind) at the last TSC i was at, I'll try again at the York one.

 

[aart]

The bottom of the brooder will be granulated PDZ ("sand"). so I'm not too worried about dripping. I couldn't find horiz. nipples (other than the cup kind) at the last TSC i was at, I'll try again at the York one.

Might have to order them online.

 

[gtaus]

... I couldn't find horiz. nipples (other than the cup kind) at the last TSC i was at, I'll try again at the York one.

Amazon.com sells the nipples for half the price of what I have locally in the stores. I prefer to buy locally, but not at twice the price. There be other online options as well.

 

[sealer39]

MyPetChicken has good prices on the horizontal nipples also. They are easy to install and they don’t drip. Just follow the instructions and remember to make air holes in the top of the waterer no matter which type you chose. If you use them, wait a couple weeks so the chicks are strong enough to use them.

 

[FlyWheel]

Might have to order them online.

Amazon.com sells the nipples for half the price of what I have locally in the stores. I prefer to buy locally, but not at twice the price. There be other online options as well.

I will, York TSC didn't have them either. Amazon, you say?

So far the voting is 2 for cups, 2 for horizontal and 1 for vertical.