Freezing Water

[LadyB]

Does anyone have a problem with water in the field freezing overnight?? I am obviously breaking the ice in the morning but am a bit worried about her during the night. However she will be getting water from the grass she is eating. Do you think she will be okay and if someone else has this problem what do you do about it??


Lou x

 

[GinaB]

Float a tennis ball in it, it moves around, stopping ice forming

 

[Mid]

Float something in the water. An empty plastic ball, a bit of wood - Anything! It should have an unfrozen ring around it.

 

[LadyB]

God you guys are good!!! Why didnt I think of that!!

 

[monica987]

that is clever!! i never thought of doing that - even though i dont deal with it

 

[JustKickOn]

at the stables i got to they put 2 tennis balls in each trough and the water hardly ever freezes

 

[gailt]

i put an apple in the water,

 

[Tia]

I'm not sure whether you are talking about the trough in the field or in the stables, but for people over here who do not have automatic heated water feeders, they can buy these shown on the link below. I have the second one down and it works great. All of my fields except one, has automatic heated waterers so I don't have to worry about them. Providing you have electric near your trough and you have an adapter then these should work well.

stock-tank-deicers

If it is for use in the stables, then you can buy heated water buckets - again you would need an adapter to transfer the voltage but these buckets work well too. They are thermostatically controlled and the element is hidden within the underneath of the bucket.

heated water buckets

 

[Lynz25]

We use a football or 2 as ours have big troughs in the field. We thought about putting a load of those balls you get in the play pits but came to the conclusion that our cheeky NF would enjoy eating them too much