Hurricane Ike and Texas in the same sentence?!? Uh oh! Please help.

[Riocotesei]

So Ike is coming our way and I don't even live in the cost. It's coming straight up through North Texas though. By the time it hits us it will be a category 2. That's pretty crazy considering where we live. Does anyone have some advise for what I should do for my chickens and other animals to make sure they're save and taken care of? Whats a hurricane like? Is it highly likely the electricity will go out? The water? What about Tornado possibilities? I have eggs on day 10 in a incubator how can I make a back up power source for them? I'm so worried! Can anyone give me some advise?

 

[Blisschick]

First and foremost, how far up north do you live? If you live up in, say, Dallas, you won't have much to worry about. It probably won't even be a hurricane by the time it gets to you. I'm guessing you've never been through one before? I live in San Jacinto County, about 60 miles north of Houston. I'll probably see lots of intense, strong wind and rain, but other than that, I'm not worried about flooding or anything. I'll probably end up with branches and/or trees in the yard.

If you live farther up than me, you probably won't see anything more than me. Chances are the lights will go out at some point, but crews are already standing by for this sort of thing, and they usually can have the lights back on in a day or two if there wasn't too much wind damage. The water will depend on if your city or whoever has back-up generator and they don't loan them out (like our stupid city did). Most places have a back-up plan for that, but just to be prepared, fill up your bathtub with water so you can flush the toilet, and stock up on fresh water to drink and cook with. Filling up any extra buckets and storing them where you can get to them helps too for watering the dogs or cats and the toilet.

You should also have some non-perishable food items in case power goes out. The general rule is to have at least three days worth. Some people stock up on ice in their deep freeze and keep a cooler nearby to keep things like sandwich fixings in it.

Back up power source: There are adapters you can buy to use in your car, or you can get a small gas powered generator. After Hurricane Rita, we bought a small one that we can run a small A/C, our deep freeze, a TV, and a lamp off of-- just enough for us to live out of one room. It's better than 4 days without electricity, trust me! Also...they don't call them hurricane lamps for nothing. Oil lamps come in pretty handy when in other parts of the house, but tend to put off a lot of heat.

If you have a barn or a shed, I would recommend putting any chicks you have in there in carriers, cages, or whatever is useful for containing them until the worst passes. Put the chickens in their coop (if you have one) and secure the door, but if you don't, don't worry too much about them. Mine had minimal shelter during Rita and did just fine, even though I had small trees leaning over from all the wind.

Tornados...just a fact of life in these parts, and they normally come with a hurricane, so all I can suggest is that if you live in a mobile home, stay with someone who isn't living in one. They're normally worse when the storm first hits, so by the time you see it, it won't be nearly as intense.

 

[d.k]

* I know it's hard NOT to worry--, but despite the tracks, I wouldn't get to frenzied at this point. . . All the o.p.'s plans are good ones, except maybe the oil lamps. . . I only have one and we never use when the storm is there, only if the power is out long, and we get low on batteries for flashlights. . . As to your incubator-- IDK!! Don't think anything but a small generator will run it, but not sure. At 8 mph, though, heck, the eggs may be hatched before the storm arrives (

)-- if it does. . . I still think it may go at least a bit off some of where they are "planning" for it to go. Hurricanes don't read weather forecasts. . . .How many chickens are you needing to secure??

 

[Riocotesei]

I live North of Dallas but our people (the weatherman that is) said that it'd be a cat. 2 when I got up here. I have a coop but it doesn't have a door..cause the sheep broke it...lol. We have two 50 gallon water drums I think we'll fill for the animals. We bought lots o' bottled water and plenty of food for animals and people. I've got some chicks in the barn, and I'll have room to put up all the big animals. So I'm mostly worried about the door-less coop and the incubator, I don't want to lose any cause they're doing so well. I agree that the storm could go in a diff. direction, but I certainly want to be prepared. It's basically flat land where I am and it gets windy real quick. Strong wind too. I'm not worried about flooding just the wind.
I've read threads about what to do with power outages for incubators, I just hope that doesn't happen.
I've never been in a tornado or hurricane situation (even though I've lived in Texas my whole life) , and I'm always first and foremost worried about my animals.
Thanks for the info and help!

 

[Blisschick]

About the oil lamps...we only use them after dark if we need to find something, etc. I didn't mean keep them going as a constant thing. Sorry if there was some confusion regarding that. I wouldn't worry about the coop not having a door either. Your birds should be fine as long as they have someplace to shelter them.

I agree with d.k, the media hypes it all up WAYYY too much and sends people into panic mode. As I type this, Beaumont has ordered mandatory evacuations, and they're not even sure it will hit that far north, much less as far north as Galveston. My kids are home from school for the weekend since classes have been cancelled, and many other school districts have done the same, yet this far north, no one really goes anywhere. I've ridden out a few hurricanes and several tropical storms, and yes, they can be a little scary, but as long as you're prepared and not living on the direct coast or flood prone areas, you really don't have much to worry about other than maybe a tree falling on your house or car.

If you want to get good information without all they hype, follow Eric Berger with the Houston Chronicle. He's no hype, just the facts, and will keep everyone updated in an intelligent, informative way. Personally, I don't even watch TV for this now, I just check his blog every few hours.

http://www.chron.com/

 

[keljonma]

d.k and blisschick make a very good point about the media. When we lived in Tomball, family and friends in Ohio would call or email whenever they would hear about hurricanes, tropical storms/depressions and/or tornadoes. I think the media that flies or drives into the area just to report on the storm always make it seem worse than it is.

Now that we're back in NE Ohio, I'm the one doing the calling to friends and family still in Texas.

Eric Berger with the Houston Chronicle does an excellent job of reporting with sanity.

A camp stove with some fuel, canned or dehydrated foods, a can opener and fresh water are important items for any emergency situation. We use a hand crank radio and flashlight for power outages here.

 

[Blisschick]

This was posted just this morning:

Eric - I've heard that hurricane force winds can be expected for Huntsville up to Palestine. Is that accurate and should I worry at this point? I live to the northeast of Huntsville.

Anything's possible but I'd peg that scenario as highly unlikely unless Ike really intensifies quickly.

Eric

Given I'm about the same latitude as Huntsville, I'm not real concerned about seeing winds that strong. I'm sure you'll see even less, since they're forecasting only a 60% chance that Ike will be a Category 3 when it hits landfall. Chances of it being stronger than that are only 15%. You'll probably only get a bad summer thunderstorm.

 

[Riocotesei]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I'm not so worried now. It sound unlikely that power would go out. And I didn't want to get my chickens blown out of the coop. lol.

 

[greenapple]

In between hurricanes in 2004 we got a power converter and a large marine battery, was hard to find a generator right after Charley went by. We ran the fridge on it off and on for the week our power was out after Jean blew by. The power converter is really nice for lower power needs, it hooks up to a large battery, like car, truck, or boat, and you can plug the incubator to the power converter.