Following my post about frozen water troughs!! *pics*

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Puppy

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Some pictures of my efforts attacking them yesterday
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Frosty whiskers!
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After a bit more hammering:

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My hands still hurt today from the concussion of trying to smash this up
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As you can see, I had a little helper
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My trough inspectors:

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Tools of the trade:

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(the wine box was full of flasks of hot water btw, not wine
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)

This is the other one, that I had to jump up and down on to break it
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BUT, finally, after a few back breaking hours, we had a result
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Which they were still able to "get into" today
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I am, however, crippled from pushing barrowfuls of water drums up there through the mud and snow
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Oh and I put my FB status last night as "H is absolutely shattered & in a world of pain, having spent all of this afternoon lugging vast quantities of water & haylage through the mud & snow for the girls. My sore face, whiplash & arthritis do NOT approve!! Please Santa, I want a quad bike for Christmas!!
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I had a phonecall today "Hello, this is father Christmas..." and offering me the loan of a quad and trailer!!
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Clearly I have been a good girl this year!
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omg
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That is bad! Ours are only a couple of inches!
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Well done though
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I wonder if I write 'dear santa, I would really like a 2 horse box for xmas' If I would get one
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Madness isn't it?!
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You wouldn't think it could take so much effort with a hammer just to break up some ice, (but that's why it's nearly dark in the last shot) There's even some standing in one of my other paddocks which looks like an ice rink, and despite a bit of slogging at it today, I could only make a mere dent in it!
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I can't say the horses seem to mine though
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I'm sure the wet weather in November bothered them more and they are enjoying the amount of haylage they are guzzling!
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*runs off to change her facebook status to one asking santa for a quad/gator*

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LOL! I can't say this is a usual occurrence for me!
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Blimey Puppy your ice is bad
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Ours have had a thin sheet of ice in comparison to that and today are fairly clear although still having to trug water across to our paddock where the weaning mares are as their container is a solid block still
 
Oh my word!!!

Mind you, I'll be taking a hammer to mine tomorrow!

Does anyone notice the tendancy to freeze being different depending on what the waters in? I.e plastic tub / metal trough??
 
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Blimey Puppy your ice is bad
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Isn't it crazy!! I'm used to stashing water in the feed room, and lugging some up the field in winter when the pipes are frozen, but I've never had such a long period of such serious freezing!! Very glad the horses don't seem too bothered by it though
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I find any plastic water filled tubs, unless they are in the feedroom wrapped in HW turnout rugs, have frozen and cracked beyond use!
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I found a thing online that says you can help prevent freezing by piling dirt around the sides of the trough or insulating it and by partially covering the top of the trough leaving enough for the horses to drink from.

In a yard that i used to work at we used to cut the bottoms out of large plastic flower pots and put them in the troughs. They float around and when the horse wants a drink it can push down on the plastic bit and water comes through the small holes as its easier to break then a larger area.

This was just for your usual south east milder freezes. Im not sure it would work on the sorts of major freezes above.

Just an idea anyway, my sympathies for those of you who have to be breaking ice right now !
 
Yes the horse must not have an aversion to floating plastic! and must be in possesion of a few brain cells which is what some of ours were lacking in and were unable to work it out but some did and it worked quite well.

Did floating thermos's of hot water not do any good?? it seems like a good idea
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Gosh you do have it bad there Puppy
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I am so grateful that we have running water (ie streams) in all our paddocks as the tap in the yard has been frozen for days and just lugging buckets from the cottage was tiresome enough! Today though I had to try and shovel the ice off the yard which was extremely slow, tedious and back breaking!
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If only I could get my car into the yard I could put a bag of salt down!
 
I would pile dry shavings or straw from the muck heap around it to insulate it a bit which might help. Really feel for you having to do all that, hope you can find a way to not have to do it again.

Ours is currently a few inches thick but can be defeated with a good kicking and stays ok for a good few hours. All the pipes are broken though, so we have resorted to having to use the pipe to the washing machine in the garage lol. Lugging 6 large containers full of water precariously balanced in a wheelbarrow through half a foot of snow is not fun, so i can sympathise with you there!

We've been surrounding our buckets and water containers with haynets or scrappy old hay that would normally be swept out. Seems to be working pretty well.
 
I am so glad i don't have to cope with that any more.

My abject apologies for being a boring old H&S fart, but please guys, mind your eyes when hammering ice, those splinters can be lethal.
 
...what about horsemuck/bedding.... deep littering is supposed to be a heat insulator for when your horse lays down in the stable to keep warm!
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Poor you lot, I do feel for you all and the horses! With my broken ankle, the OH is doing my neddies for me.... sort of pleased... as now he appreciates what having a horse actually means!! ....but at the same time, I wish it was me out there taking care of them!
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I hear the floating object in troughs work, like a ball, wood, etc... I wonder if you have a chisel/pick to hammer into the ice, if it will break up easier? xx
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This was just for your usual south east milder freezes. Im not sure it would work on the sorts of major freezes above.

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I am South East
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I'm in Cambridgeshire!
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Instead of loft insulation
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how about using old rugs if you have any spare to wrap the trough in, keep it nice n snug
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I was thinking I would try this
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Until I remembered one little flaw of my horse's....... She's a rug chewer!
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She is also rather mischievous with anything and everything else around her (like finding her hay hutch rolled half way across the field today
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) so I would be concerned that anything I put in or around the trough she would manage/attempt to consume.
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Gosh you do have it bad there Puppy
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Yes, I believe the South East has been the worst effected, which we're not used to!! What the rest of the country is now suffering from, we've been dealing with for the last week!
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I was thinking of using muck, but having been picking it up this afternoon, it's as frozen as the water trough, and as they are out 24/7 we don't have a muck heap.

The good news is, I went to put some rubbish out a few minutes ago, and am pleased to say that it's melted a fair bit. Metcheck predicts that it will be warmer the next couple of days, so I am hopeful we're past the worst of it, and it won't be as hard to manage from here on
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...but your helpers and tough inspectors are gorgeous and clearly take their work very seriously. Happy xmas Pups x

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Thank you
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Beans wants to help, in the hope it's a game. Star, being the boss, is of course just there to oversee things
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But they did make the work more fun
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Happy Christmas to you too
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xx
 
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