Water Freezing - no electricity to coop- any ideas?

[scratch'n'peck]

not sure if anyone has seen the tv commercial for a battery powered sauce/gravy stirrer...you put it in the bottom of the pan and it constantly moves things around...i think these would be great for keeping the water from freezing...we haven't gotten one yet but when i see them in the store i am going to get a couple...right now we are breaking the ice on the water bowls 2 times a day...my what we go thru for these chickens lol!

That's actually a pretty clever idea. Moving water sure doesn't freeze. We use moving water to keep water open for our water fowl with a pump. I suppose the gravy stirrer could work the same way as long as it moves the surface of the water enough.

 

[chickenbusiness]

Great information. Thank you

 

[jdeoliveira74]

one glass mat battery sold at harbor freight with the solar panel is under $200 those batteries will last 10 years if cared for properly. and u can easily run a 40 watt aquarium heater from that set up all day and have no problems!

 

[FarmGirl-NC]

I have a barn with goats. They stay in there all night. The barn is 20 degrees warmer than outside with no added heat except the goat's body heat.

If you have larger animals, you could let the chickens sleep with them at night.

 

[chickenbusiness]

We have to de-ice our water for our chicks in the mornings.

 

[dragonlair]

I live considerable further north and our temps have been well below 0. I water the chickens and Guineas in the morning and again later in the day. They know to fill up while the water is fluid. I messed around with adding molasses and electrolytes to help keep it liquid longer but it just wasn't worth it. Even without lights, I have had eggs all winter and they are all nice and healthy. This method has worked for me for years.

 

[bazza56]

Has anyone ever tried a solar cell set up to see if it will get enough heat to melt the water? Just wondering, found this http://www.squidoo.com/livestock-water-heaters

 

[Mac in Wisco]

There were a few articles in Farm Show magazine that showed waterers with a buried ground loop to pick up geothermal heat. One was a commercially made cattle water for $1500 that takes a backhoe to install. The other was homemade. It was a 13 gallon plastic basin with an eight foot deep ground loop made out of 2" PVC pipe. (Imagine a "U" of PVC pipe underneath a basin. Within the basin there were short risers of PVC pipe of unequal length so that the water would circulate within the loop by convection). The basin was installed in the ground and covered with it's own snap-on lid with a 4" hole drilled in the middle for the chickens to drink the water from.

 

[bazza56]

Has anyone ever tried an aquarium heater?

 

[onedoodle3]

You can buy a dog dish that plugs in at Walmart. They work great.

Now, I don't know about the OP but I'm not sure I want to run extension cords all the way from Walmart to my coop! That's over 35 miles!

Sorry...that just hit me funny....