Winter is here and we are not prepared! We finally got feed up with water bowls and switched to nipples in plastic apple juice jugs, overall have been very happy.
This was to be TEMPORARY, hubby was going to build a heated nipple watering system with PVC pipes running into each breeder pen. Summer flew by and here we are, its almost December and we live in Wisconsin. The jugs in each pen are not going to cut it, not going to run extension cords to 12 pens for individual water heaters. Winters past we had 2 coops with a heated water bowl in each but we just had mixed groups of birds now daughter has show/breeding chickens.
Because winter is here, I thought I would see who else has a similar system and how well it works, what problems you have had and how you corrected them.
Engineering hubby is going to create a heated recirculation watering system.
Basically this is what he is planning:
- a 5 gallon bucket in each coop
- 25 watt submirsible aquaruim heater (or similar) in bucket
- recirculation pump for in bucket
- PVC pipes running from bucket into each pen with nipples
The submirsible heater would keep the water warm and the recirculation pump would pump the warm water continuously from the bucket through the pvc pipes and back into the bucket. This will keep the water in the lines from freezing and hopefully the nipples will not freeze up.
So, does it work, we are nipples freeze?
This was to be TEMPORARY, hubby was going to build a heated nipple watering system with PVC pipes running into each breeder pen. Summer flew by and here we are, its almost December and we live in Wisconsin. The jugs in each pen are not going to cut it, not going to run extension cords to 12 pens for individual water heaters. Winters past we had 2 coops with a heated water bowl in each but we just had mixed groups of birds now daughter has show/breeding chickens.
Because winter is here, I thought I would see who else has a similar system and how well it works, what problems you have had and how you corrected them.
Engineering hubby is going to create a heated recirculation watering system.
Basically this is what he is planning:
- a 5 gallon bucket in each coop
- 25 watt submirsible aquaruim heater (or similar) in bucket
- recirculation pump for in bucket
- PVC pipes running from bucket into each pen with nipples
The submirsible heater would keep the water warm and the recirculation pump would pump the warm water continuously from the bucket through the pvc pipes and back into the bucket. This will keep the water in the lines from freezing and hopefully the nipples will not freeze up.
So, does it work, we are nipples freeze?