seriously this watering thing is making me insane!`

[erindubb]

Hi - I have had chicks for four days now. They are in a large cardboard box in my garage. Really large - like a fridge. I have three chicks. I bought the gallon waterer that is red plastic on the bottom and it has a wire on the top to hang it in the future. Yeah right. I can not even imagine that. When I try to even hold it from that hook it doesn't stay stable enough and all the water leaks out. The reason it makes me insane is because I have had to take all the chicks out and dry the box out and start all over with new bedding every single day even twice a day. The dumb thing will not stop leaking. I understand it works by gravity and must be totally level for it not to leak - and I make sure it is that way when I put it in the brooder. I will even stare at it for 10 minutes to make sure. All is good - then somehow I come back and all the water is soaking into the cardborad and it is empty.! Ahhh - so I bought a hampster waterer and showed all the chicks how to do it. I took the big horrible one out. I came back a few hours later and none of the water in the hampster thing had been drunk. I brought in a little bowl or water and they all drank like they were going to die - so obviously they didn't understand how to use the hampster thing. What is the solution. If I have to dry that thing out again I am going to cry. Plus I will be at work all day today -so i am nervous for them. Today is the first day i have to work since i have had them.

 

[Marie1234]

You can go back to the plastic one with the red bottom. The secret is to get it sitting up on something so it is higher than the bedding by a couple inches. Bricks, cake pan, whatever you can find to keep it high. You can set a couple pieces of wood scraps or branches in the brooder for them to climb up to it if they need to. Good luck!

 

[teach1rusl]

If your chicks are really small, like less than two weeks old, I'd make sure that the dish you feed them water in is very shallow. They actually sell chick waterers, and at least mine was great...never had any leaks. Might be worth a small investment; they can use it for several weeks. I have the metal waterer now, and haven't had any issues; I didn't care for the adult plastic waterers because you have to turn most of them upside down to fill, and it just seemed a hassle to me. It sounds like something is going on with your seal too, if it's all coming out like that...

 

[bigstack]

When ever the chicks walked over to mine it would tilt. the bedding was being pushed down by the weight of the waterer and the chick. I know they dont wheigh much but it would stll tilt. I just dug out a spot down to the hard bottom and added a brick. I set the brick on the card board then placed the waterer on that. I just pushed the bedding back up to the edge of the brick. It worked until they got old enough to try to fly! They would try to perch on top of it and tilt it all over! When I hung it up it was alot better. If it tilted at all it was when they tried to stand on the edge. When I hung the waterer up I added a small brick under the waterer. just to stop it from tilting. It helped to keep things alot dryer!!! I had 47 chicks in the box! When they all got to running around and flapping..... Now that is another story! LOL

P.s. Mine was very unstable when hanging frrom my finger, But when hanging from a string or wire it was fine!

Good Luck and God Bless!

 

[bwinn01]

I know this is a little late, your chicks are probably living outside now. I also tried the hampster thing, the bottle hanging on the side of the cage. My chicks LOVED it. I had to touch the ball a few times to make water come out, then they started pecking at it. They now live outside in the big pen and I give them both the hanging one gallon and the bottle. They seem to be entertained by the bottle and drink mostly out of the larger thing. They still will all gather around the bottle and peck at it and drink the water.

Bwinn

 

[MareeZoCool]

When I first started raising chicks, I used a shallow bowl for their water supply. I was and am home 24/7, so keeping the water and living area clean has never been an issue. Besides, all that cleaning gives me an excuse to hang out with my best friends, those fluffy-butts!

 

[RedfogsFlock]

We bought some small waterers from our feed store for about 3 or 4 dollars, and they work great! They have a small red base, and a white bottle for the top. I've seen the one you are talking about, and I thought they would leak, so now I know! Anyways our small ones held over 2 ducks, and 5 chicks for at least 10 hours a day. Hope it helps.