Well Water

[dawg53]

One or two tablespoons per gallon of water should do it. As hot as it has been here this past summer, I had to change their water twice a day. I went thru quite abit ACV. Now that the heat has slacked some, I change it once a day.

 

[Tala]

Our local tap water is high in calcium, they put lime in it to work on the pH I think. It makes a white goopy stuff on aluminum, when I tried to use an aluminum-housed auto-waterer.
Hasn't seem to affect my birds either way though.

 

[Ed62]

I add ACV to ours, but I didn't know it would take care of calcium. I use it because I heard it's supposed to be a detriment to coccidiosis (sp?).

Ed

 

[hinkjc]

We're on well water too and I've never had any issues with any of my birds drinking it. I rarely add ACV as I found it can lead to sour crop if given too long. It's a great supplement, but I wouldn't recommend using it long term. As with most treats and supplements, moderation is key.

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

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[GoldenCometLover]

Hi hinkjc - I hear that if you add ACV to your water it helps with worm prevention (the calcium control aspect was new to me!) - I certainly don't want to OVERUSE it, is once a week a reasonable amount for worm prevention or is that not enough? I am trying to keep all natural as possible, but want my girls happy and healthy and am terrified of any crop problems....I checked the crop surgery thread one night and thought I was going to pass out

I went right out the next morning and checked each hens crops because I was so worried!! All good, but I want to prevent worms, but not end up with Sour crop - some experienced advice would be appreciated!!!

 

[Mac in Wisco]

Quote:
Probably a bit too neurotic. Hard water is generally not detrimental to poultry, unless it has extremely high levels of calcium. Water is considered "very hard" when it has over 180 ppm of calcium. Some literature I have read states that levels over 500 ppm may be detrimental to poultry, other literature says 1000 ppm. I doubt your well water has levels that high. Most wells drilled into limestone formations are going to have hard water, it is very common.

We have very hard well water and it hasn't caused any problems with our 2500 hens. It is hard on the equipment though. Every so often I have to use needle nose pliers to actually break away lime deposits that form on the watering nipples. We inject citric acid into the watering system every couple of weeks to help cut the deposits, similar to what people are doing with ACV. The birds like the slightly acidified water and it probably helps with intestinal parasites.

 

[mdbokc]

Mine prefer well water over the treated city water in a heartbeat.

 

[gryeyes]

I am so glad somebody started this thread! I'm on well water and simply adjusted to the various "interesting" aspects of same. Never thought a minute about the chickens.... I treated the water in my gold fish and koi ponds when I first built them (because I was reading up on such things and most of the fish-keeping world panics at high PH values), but finally gave THAT up and the darned fish adapted quite well.

The landlady does not treat the well water at all. Sometimes there's a bit of a sulpher odor (I feel like a salad when I get out of the shower) and I leaned I MUST condition my hair every time I wash it. Boy howdy.

So I guess I need to be a bit more pro-active about ACV.

 

[Chickenaddict]

I too have well water, never had a problem. I also offer oyster shells (which they rarely eat) free choice.