How do you keep your water from freezing?

[ErikaRI]

Hi all,
After talking to the woman at the local poultry supply store, I bought a heated dog bowl to use for our coop. Last week I switched to using that (instead of our galvanized waterer).

I'm already seeing some problems with it and things I don't like--chiefly that it's really easy for my Polish top hat to get her head feathers wet, which makes me worry about her on cold nights. But it also needs to be totally dumped almost daily, because it gets totally full of straw. Pretty sure the girls don't care if they poop in it, either.

So I'm wondering what people prefer? I saw a bunch of options on Amazon, ranging from $15-$70. I'd like something I can use with what we have already...

ETA: this is a small suburban flock. 4 hens and a small coop.

 

[BantyChooks]

Following along to see if you find a solution. I'm afraid I'm not much help because I use plain rubber bowls and re-fill them 3x a day.

 

[Brahma Chicken5000]

I don’t heat my chickens’ waterer either. I empty it out at night and refill it with warm water in the morning and afternoon.

 

[chickens really]

You can order heated Chicken water fonts...I also use Rubber livestock bowls...

 

[chickmom3941]

We have used a large heated dog bowl for years, and love it! We don't have any polish, though, so don't have to worry about their heads getting wet; I can see where that could be a problem for you. As for keeping the water clean, we don't have many problems with that. We have the bowl up on a large brick, so it's about 8"-10" off the floor, and not much gets in it. Our chickens seemed to really like when we changed from the large vat with the little drip waterer thingies, to the more natural dog bowl. I would recommend it for chickens without fancy head feathers!

 

[mymilliefleur]

I don’t heat my chickens’ waterer either. I empty it out at night and refill it with warm water in the morning and afternoon.

Same here.

 

[JDWIi]

I use a cinder block and place a light bulb in the hallow cavity. The socket itself is bolted to a base fitting snuggly inside the block. I then place a ceramic tile directly on top of the block distributing the heat evenly while protecting the plastic waterer. Hope this helps

 

[Krazyquilts]

What I'm planning to do if/when we get rabbits and /or quail is to use nipple waters and then have a livestock watering trough de-icer in it. I used nipple waterers for one batch of chicks are really how much cleaner they were. I think nipple waterers would work great for Polish chickens.

If anyone has used anything like what I've described, I'd love to hear if it worked or not.

 

[Chick N Mom 3]

We use a 3 gallon heated water fountain from TSC. It does require electricity so not sure if you have access to electric. We hang the waterer in the run. I don’t keep water in the coop itself since we have 3 hens and it’s a smaller coop. We’ve had many below freezing nights and no water freezing! It costs about 45.00 and I didn’t want to spend that much but it’s worth not worrying about it.

 

[GC-Raptor]

This is my setup. . I took an old 5 quart dutch oven and installed a bottle lamp kit with a 43 watt halogen bulb. .plugged into a Thermo-cube. .
It kept my 2 gallon fount unfrozen down to -13F two nights last winter. I also have higher wattage bulbs if needed. The bulbs lasted about 40 days during the coldest part of winter. . GC