Posted: 2/28/2011 7:38:52 AM EDT
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Situation: The wife & I moved to a farm at the end of last year. No water source at the barn. The previous owner ran a hose from the well that is about 200m away.
Problem: Need water at the barn for chickens. May add additional livestock in the future, but not this year. Would like to eventually have a setup that would give me something similar to a residential garden hose at the barn for filling water and cleaning. Short-Term Solution: Buy a few of the blue poly water barrels and fill them at the house/well and strap them to a pallet. I would rotate the barrel pallets to/from the barn with the tractor. Long-Term Solution: The barn has a metal roof, so I will setup a gutter system sometime later this year. that will drain to a rain barrel initially. When the budget allows, we plan to bury a large poly tank to use as a water supply and as backup water storage. We will pump it out with an electric pump. Depending on what I do with livestock, we may add a future well in vicinity of the barn. Question: How are you pumping water out of your water barrels? What is a durable and low cost way to pump 5-10 gallons at a time? I was thinking about buying a pitcher pump and adding a length of pipe and droppong it into a bung on the top of the barrel. Am I wasting my time? should I just install a spout at the bottom of the barrels and use a length of garden hose? Thanks for your input. |
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Trench a pipe from house/well to the barn. Install a frost proof hydrant-style shut off.
You will be glad you did it. Just as reference I buried [3] 4" corrugated drain pipes about 150 feet, in about 5 hours with a small mini-backhoe. How many hours will you spend hauling water in barrels over a years time? You can rent a small walk behind trencher and have a 200 foot trench opened in hour or so? |
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Quoted:
Trench a pipe from house/well to the barn. Install a frost proof hydrant-style shut off. You will be glad you did it. This is the way to go. Everything else is just a stopgap measure. May seem too expensive, but doing it once beats spending money on an interim solution and having to come back later and spend the money anyway. |