Frozen waterers....Not anymore!!

Who hates busting frozen water multiple times a day for your chickens? The answer is everyone! This is my second winter with chickens and I absolutely hate busting the ice out of their water. Last year I had the twisty type waterers and, not joking at all, pulled a muscle in my back trying open those frozen suckers and was down for 2 weeks. This summer I switched to 5-gallon buckets with the drip cups. Let me tell you, they are AH-MAZING! For the summer. Not the winter. Those little cups froze and started breaking off as soon as the temps dropped below freezing. I ended up putting a shallow Rubbermaid container out and filled it with hot water I carried from the house every morning. Sometimes refilling multiple times a day if the temps were cold enough to refreeze the water. Let's just say I was not willing to do this all winter. I started looking into different options to heat the water. I looked at heated water bases and fish tank heaters. Finally, I landed on bird bath heaters. For $20 I figured what could it hurt to try? And oh my goodness!! It has been the greatest thing ever! It keeps the water nice and toasty and, while I still have to pack water once a day to keep it topped off, I no longer have to break the ice multiple times a day. So far I've been using the heater for two weeks and it's doing great. I highly recommend looking into the pros and cons of these heaters if you have smaller animal waterers (I'm sure they wouldn't work in large troughs) and have access to power in/near your chicken coop/run.

Birdbath Heater