North Dakota

[twisted-acres-farm]

I have a metal fount that I put on a heated base, you can get both at runnings/tsc. I keep them set on a set of cinderblocks. The only problem I have with them is that the fount starts to rust? I may end up going to the heated plastic waterer. It has always kept the water from freezing though.

this has always worked for me as well.

 

[Zone3Dakota]

okay, we are only thirty miles from the Canada/USA border, so we get some serious cold weather. For my pigeons, we ended up using water bucket heaters, just drop them in the bucket. This keeps the water from freezing from bottom to top. The bucket was put into an insulated 'box'. The front of the box was partially open, so that they could drink. The top had an insulated cover so that they wouldn't bathe in it. We put concrete block for them to reach the top. On one of the insulated boxes, we got the height too short, so we just notched out a little of the bucket. This winter was an experiment, but now that we know that the bucket heaters are dependable, even down to -30(f) or however cold it got here, this winter, we will do a more permanent version for next winter.

We found these bucket heaters in Minot... North Country Mercantile at 2000 20th Ave SE, Minot, ND 58701
(701) 838-0081 (Love this store...)

At first, we tried a bucket with a heated bottom, but that didn't put out enough to keep the top of the water from freezing.

 

[sellison]

This is honestly what I would probably do too if I didn't have call ducks, who would all try to squeeze into it. Having crunchy/frozen pants from fumbling with the waterer isn't fun.

I have mine on a cinder cement block in the corner of the coop so they can't perch on the back half of it but if they were trying to get in the dog dish, I would put a piece of wood over half or 3/4 of the dish and put a heavy rock on top. This would also keep the heat in more, though we get 40 below here and I have never had any trouble. It works great. But then I am not a mechanic and carpenter and would have to rely on the husband to do anything fancier. I love low maintenance stuff. The dog dish is easy to move around if I have to but then I have seven coops and really try to only use two in the winter.

Right now my chicks are getting ready to hatch and I will have to use a regular summer waterer. The ones that have a lid so you dump the water in and have a float. For them I just put a heat tape in the waterer because the heat lamp for the chicks keep the lip where the water comes out warm enough. Otherwise the lip always freezes over night. I don't like heated bases because I use plastic waterers and they have melted them before and the mice like to hide under there.

Different things work for different people and I like everyone's ideas.

 

[kodster]

Ok, anyone's birds laying... I know marvun22 and LeviS said theirs stopped. Mine stopped in January, and haven't had an egg yet. Now, with the typical manic spring weather (roller-coaster, up and down), they still haven't started laying, but I keep checking. Just wondering about everyone else.

 

[Tuhmu]

Mine started again about three weeks ago. Though I still have some brahma pullets from last March that never did start laying and still haven't.

 

[kodster]

Mine started again about three weeks ago. Though I still have some brahma pullets from last March that never did start laying and still haven't.

Good to know, Levi... yours stopped laying about a month earlier than mine. Hoping mine will kick in soon!

 

[twisted-acres-farm]

mine never quit laying but production is all over the place. 70 plus hens getting high teen's to upper 50's

 

[sellison]

I have never had mine stop laying. (Knock on Wood) I have about 20 pullets who are just turning a year this spring, plus 20 2 year olds. The least I got this winter was a doz a day but they are up to 18 now. The pullets started laying end of September while my older hens went through there molt. I do this rotation every year. Though this year I have a bunch of muts that have more meat, then laying attributes because I wanted to incubate my own meat birds. But my RR would do 60 to 70 percent past years, in the winter. Love those birds.

I don't have heat in the coop. The big thing is light. I have programable timers on my lights in the hen house. I turn them on in October and off come April. They are programmed to be on from 4am until 9am. I mostly feed just wheat.

 

[stryker]

Mine have laid from 20-26 on average. About 20 eggs a day most of the time.This was with light all winter..... Currently since daylight savings time, I turn off the light and it has been 12-13 a day.. I might have to turn the light back on since they are not going to be free loaders.

 

[kodster]

I have had supplemental light in the hen house ever since the days started getting shorter, from 5 am until about 9 am, and then again, from 4 pm until 10 pm. Doesn't seem to matter to them... they have their run, where they have access to it 24/7 (about the only time I close it is when I need everyone out of the hen house, so I can muck it out)... I've been fortunate that we haven't had any predators (knock on wood), but I live inside the limits of a small city (less than 500), so just enough activity in town to keep the predators away, 24/7. The only ones we have are a couple of stray dogs that belong to the family that runs the township (nepotism runs rampant here), and I chase them off enough that they hardly come around, because they know they're not welcome. BB gun does wonders... gets their attention, but doesn't kill them. Anyways, the chickens put themselves to bed as soon as the natural light starts to fade, and occasionally, I'll see a rooster and a couple of hens at sundown in the run, but not for long. I've had no eggs since the beginning of February, with the terrible sub-zero temps here. Of course, with the weather warming up now, and the days getting longer, I'm hoping that spring is in the air and they'll start laying. I had no shortage of eggs last winter, but we didn't have the severity of the sub-zero temps then, that we had this winter, and for so long. I've got about 30 hens.