How to Make an Automatic Chicken Waterer with Nipple Drippers
This Video is from the Youtube channel: “Rob Bob’s Aquaponics & Backyard Farm”.
How to Make an Automatic Chicken Waterer with Nipple Drippers
Made up a chicken waterer for the girls cage over the past few days. This one is 25L/6½ gal in size & should last the 4 of them for at least a week if not longer I think.
A closed in waterer like this will also help to keep the water cleaner. It was a constant battle with the girls scratching dirt into their old feeder making it necessary to clean it every second day.
This waterer definitely took some of the "AWWW DAAAD" out of the daily chicken choirs.
The drill I used was an 8.5mm. 8.8mm or 11/32 are the suggested sizes for the tap size..
The tap used was a 1/8th BSP
You have some smart chooks there Rob! Very cool watering setup there as well! Shame we can’t get plants to drink water that way!
This looks like a great setup Rob! Wish my city didn’t have a ban on keeping backyard chickens. Have a great day and happy gardening!
Great idea.
BTW, the priming fluid also has a pink dye so you can see which bits have been done and which haven’t. Handy when you’re doing a lot of fittings. 🙂
Sounds good Charles.. Looking to set up some floating rafts against the fence with the chook yard.. The wicking bed there has been compromised by mango roots I think..
If you feel like posting a clip of your system I would like to have a look..
Cheers & have a great one Charles..
Thanks. I like watching your videos. I made a bulk chicken feeder much like the one you showed. I especially like the simplicity of your work, and low cost. For this waterer, one way to make it simpler would be to install the nipples directly into the bottom of the container, and suspend the container at the correct height for the chickens. This is what I have done, and seems to work very well for my small flock.
Very true & have seen a few very good feeders made that way..
The pipe with nipples will eventually be fed through a pipe connected to a large barrel located elsewhere in the garden.. The small drum is a bit of a stop gap measure as we went away for a week & needed the waterer up & running.. Hope to have a clip up on how it will be finely plumbed up in a few weeks..
Have a good one Steve..
Brilliant! My wife and I are fixin to get going with chickens and this would be fantastic to do. Thanks so much!
Thanks for your good ideas, Rob. You may have posted how you built your chicken coop, but I may have missed it, have you? I am interested to build one and want a very simple easy to follow instructions. Thank you, Alona from Fox Island Washington.
One of the best things we have done for the girls I think Brandon.. They always have clean water & the wastage has gone down dramatically..
Have fun with the build..
Cheers,
Rob.
Sounds like a great set up.. Would love to “play” with a larger aquaponic set up & some other animals but we will just have to be patient & wait methinks..
Have fun setting it all up & all the best with your farm,
Rob 🙂
Hey Rob;
Thanks for the cool idea. I just wanted to mention that priming is unneccesary when gluing PVC. All you require is the glue which melts down the PVC enough to bond the fittings securely. It is also easier to complete one union at a time so you don’t have a bunch of glue covered bits to worry about getting at quickly. Also, we use a glue which is pretty much clear so aesthically you don’t have the blue staining.
Hi there 🙂
I put 1 in for each bird but you quite often see them drinking together from one nipple so probably get away with having less.. The only time I see the girls all wanting to feed/drink together is when we top up the feed/water containers other wise they all fairly much do their own thing..
Hope that helps a bit..
Rob.
Mate, your videos are a great help, especially for someone like me who is just starting out with chooks.
Keep up the bloody good work champ!
Cheers
Ben.
So the cost to feed each chicken will depend on how much foraging or home grown feed you can provide them yourself.. I think that they still need some sort of supplemental feed in most cases..
Hope that is of some help to you & have fun with the chooks, I think they are great animals to have around..
Cheers, Rob.
Another great idea, I’ll be using this one too when I get my chickens, thanks mate, you have a new subscriber, going to get into aquaponics at some stage which you have too, thanks again for taking the time to share your videos, you’re providing a great service, hope you continue to keep making these videos for along time to come, Well done!
Hi Rob,
Great videos – just finished making an identical system to the one in your video.
Just a few notes I felt were worth sharing:
– Nipple drippers purchased from ebay may vary slightly… mine looked identical to Robs but needed a slightly larger hole to thread themselves into. A 23/64 drill bit made all the difference. If yours aren’t going in, try that slightly larger drill bit.
– Rather than use silicone plumbers tape around the nipple threads, I opted for a 7mm x 1.9mm black rubber O-ring, replacing the clear rubber washer that came with the dripper. Tightened up they provide a perfect seal.
That last one sounds like an obscure item but Aldi often sell an assortment of O ring sealers in a handy pack. Comes with fibre washers, black rubber washers and white PVC washers. Well worth picking up when they’re on sale.
Thanks for sharing the design Rob, you’ve made my chook related chores that much easier and I can finally bin that disgusting green algae farm that was the previous water feeder!
Nice one & thanks for the tips 🙂 I think the yellow ones are slightly thinner again..
I saw the O rings at Aldi the other week but kept on walking.. Kicked myself on the weekend while building the fish farm as I could of used a few… Shall grab them next time 😉
Cheers & hope the chooks enjoy your work..
Have a great one..
Great video! You make it simple enough for even little old ladies like me to do! Seriously though, I like your style and how you keep it simple. Thanks!
Hi Jane.. Glad you liked the clip & hope it gives you a few ideas..
Thanks for the heads up, is great to know it’s helping folks out there 🙂
All the best,
Rob 🙂
Hi Rob,
I love this! If I ever get a bigger flock I’ll definitely take the time to make a watering station. So far the birds drink from a regularly cleaned pond along with the rabbits and other house pets and wildlife. However since getting the ducks the pond has become something of a mess. So I’ll need to fix both the pond and make a good clean watering station for all the animals including the chickens.
Thanks for sharing!!
Scarlett
7:53 Looking good!
Do you have a pond Rob?
How to Grow a Garden with Scarlett Damen Morning Scarlett..
The drippers are a great way to get clean water to the birds..
No pond here as we have feral cane toads that take them over.. They managed to climb into a bathtub pond we had set up by using the garden bed that was next to it as a ladder.. They poisoned most of the fish but we saved some that now live inside the house in a tank.. Would like to set up another one at some point a it did a great job at attracting frogs into the patch as well..
Thanks & all the best,
Rob..
Great video Rob. I have an igloo 10 gallon water container that I’m going to use. It will keep the water from heating up in the summer. Thanks for showing me how to do this attachment for the water nipples. Love all your videos 🙂
Hi Diana.
Sounds like a good way to give the birds access to cool water. Have fun with the build 👍
Rob
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Cheers all & have a top one. 😊
Rob Bob’s Backyard Farming & Aquaponics i
Rob Bob’s Backyard Farm & Aquaponics nice one !! If you install 1 or 2 wires above the pipe, it will prevent the chickens jump on it. They might think it is a perch for them. Chicken weight avg 1-1.5 kg lol
@MA MJ l😘😘😘😘😘😘
@MA MJ 😅