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Need tips on keeping water from freezing!

post #1 of 9
11/29/09 at 1:24pm
Thread Starter 
I could really use some tips on keeping the water I set out for the strays from freezing now that it's getting cold. I can't afford to get electric bowls you can buy for all the places I feed at so I'm hoping someone has some suggestions for something home made that I could use. How do you guys solve this problem?
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post #2 of 9
11/29/09 at 1:54pm
I was going to say a heated bowl, until I read the rest of your post. You can try using a bowl less conductive of the cold, like plastic, but plastic isn't the best to use for feeding and water. You can try placing the water bowl inside a slightly larger plastic bowl. You can also line the inside of the larger bowl with a towel or those plastic "peanuts" that will act as insolation. This will help slow down the freezing, but unless you use a heated bowl, it will freeze. For the strays that I feed, I check their water twice per day, morning and night. I fill the bowls with warm (not hot) water, so that it will last a little longer.
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post #3 of 9
11/29/09 at 2:30pm
We use warm water and put fresh water out morning and evening, the same time we feed. We use ceramic dishes.

You can also purchase a swimming pool solar cover, stretch it between to lawn chairs, anchor it down, and put the water under there (depending upon where you're feeding, of course). Obviously enclosing it leaving two openings will keep things a LOT warmer, but will likely discourage the ferals from using it.
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post #4 of 9
11/29/09 at 2:51pm
Use a slightly larger bowl and float a small rubber ball in it. That will stop it, until the cats fish the ball out of course!
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post #5 of 9
11/29/09 at 2:52pm
We have a few people who feed our colony, one being a retired woman whose garden backs onto their field. She also has the solar cover for a pool but one weekend when we all were away we got styrofoam containers and placed bowls in that - it didnt stop the top from freezing from the ambient temp but stopped the deep freeze from below the bowl.

I know someone who puts rocks in boiling water and then in the bowl with warm water, it means they are drinking warm water if they go right to it but at least they get water and it cools off quickly but the rocks stay warm enough that it doesnt freeze and absorb some of the sunlight to stop freezing throughout the day.
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post #6 of 9
11/29/09 at 4:07pm
The hot rocks do sound like a good idea, especially if you had some sort of thermal container.

I wonder, since moving water seems harder to freeze - you know like, leaving a faucet drip - could you fix it so that the water is dripping or moving?

How cold are we talking?

Do you have enough sun to use a solar panel of sorts? to heat the water?
Something like solar yard lights - maybe something like that with a light bulb would generate enough heat?

Just brain storming - I live in the desert, and I have the opposite problem in the heat of the summer - keeping the water cool and not so hot that you could use it for hot tea.
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post #7 of 9
11/29/09 at 6:30pm
I was also going to suggest a heated bowl, but if that won't work then I would check the water twice a day.
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post #8 of 9
11/30/09 at 9:17am
Thread Starter 
Thanks everyone. I like all the ideas. I guess I'm just going to have to play with it to see what works best. Last winter I just fed at one place right behind my house so it wasn't a big issue to keep exchanging the water but now I feed at four places so it would be a little much. It's especially bad in January and February when it gets really cold, like single digits. The water I put out, even though it's warm, will freeze solid in no time.
Another care taker I talked to yesterday suggested putting one of those hand and foot warmers that you buy for a dollar underneath the bowl. According to her it keeps the water from freezing. That may work well too.

This winter the hubby has luckily agreed to let me open up our garage to the strays in our alley and I plan to put a space heater in there so the cats here should be okay. I'm just so worried about the others. Indiana winter is brutal.
What worries me the most though is all the poor dogs that are stuck chained in the snow with only some crappy plastic dog house as shelter, if even that. At least the cats can find some little nooks and crannies to curl up in but the dogs are chained up and can't go anywhere. It just hurts me to the bone to see all these poor neglected animals trapped in miserery. I hate people.
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post #9 of 9
11/30/09 at 10:32am
That is a GREAT idea.

...and yeah... people can really suck.

Thank you for all your hard work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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