Will my chickens eat snow if their water freezes? Will they be safe?

[6chicks&aduck]

i use a cookie tin heater , w no freezing yet and even thogh my birds have water available the r also eating snow . some times i see them eat it often

 

[skippyscage]

mine eat snow when perfectly fine non-frozen water is available.

chickens have choices too

 

[nab58]

My brother swears his chickens survive eating snow. He doesn't have a water heater and get out only a couple of time a day to break the ice off the top of the water.

 

[rlkern]

I use heated dog dishes (we have electricity available). I fill them up with fresh water everyday but the water stays melted and I don't have to break ice. This saves me time in the long run and the water dishes have their own thermo control in them. They come on when it reaches to just above freezing and then turn off when it gets to I think around 35 or 40 degrees. The other thing I do is if it is a plastic dish, I use a stainless steel dish inside of that as a liner so say if it's in the coop (where I do keep one), I can just remove the stainless, dump nasty water out, wipe clean with a paper town and refill. Outside, I have two 3qt ones that have their own stainless liner built in so all I have to do is dump dirty water, wipe clean and refill. They're outside, so dumping is easy.

 

[Saltcreek]

They do eat snow. Water consumption from their water bucket is cut in half here when I have snow (Ohio). They have warm water all the time as I use a hanging 5 gallon bucket with nipples underneath outside in their pen year round. In winter I just hang a birdbath heater inside the bucket thru a notch in the edge of the cover. When temp gets to the low teens or single digits I just check to be sure the nipples outside didn't freeze but they seldom do.

 

[weshard]

I spoil my chicken, heated coop plus heated water systems. My farmer neighbor on the other hand says, they are chickens they will servive. His do eat snow all winter and do fine. He does feed them corn when he feeds the cattle in the winter, but otherwise they find a place to get out of the wind and cold as much as they can. We had twenty five below the other night. Because the rooster he has is from my flock I today brought over a heated dog bowl so the chickens have warmer water. I also bring him canned cat food which they all love and bird seed once in a while. As you can tell I am not a farmer, I spoil everything.

 

[CindyR]

My chickens have been eating snow for years and are healthy. I live in Alberta, Canada where we just had some very cold weather, temps around -30 C. The chickens are doing fine just like all the wild birds, foxes, coyotes, deer, moose, rodents and numerous other wild animals who eat snow.

 

[4 hens in yard]

I use a coffee cup warmer that is used on your desk to keep your coffee warm. I sit it on a cement block and then sit my metal water dish on top. Hasn't froze yet at -20 C! Works great

 

[CindyR]

It's good that people are considering the possibilities that eating snow will cause dehydration or lower body temperature, however wild animals from large to small like deer, fox, coyotes, squirrels down to the tiniest of birds get hydrated by eating snow in the winter. I cannot see why a chicken can't do the same, in fact from my experience they can. Does it take more volume of snow? Yes, so just give them enough snow. I throw in a shovelful every day and they never eat it all. Of course it depends on how many chickens you have. A large flock will take more. I only have 5-6 chickens so a shovelful is more than enough. I have never lost a chicken in the winter and our winters here in Alberta, Canada can get down to -35 or colder, my coop is not heated although it's very well insulated. In terms of body temperature, eating snow has never affected them negatively, they strut about outside in their pen quite happily even on the coldest of days.

 

[bryansatv]

I gave up giving my chickens water when snow is on the ground. They will not touch the water when there is snow. They seem to prefer it. Its funny I put a fresh bowl of water in there and they look at it and then look at me like what is this crap. I put fresh snow in there bowl they all fight to get to it.