Wildlife Water Station (Info needed)

[Jzoch]

Picked up five totes earlier this week for a couple other lease members and myself. Could y'all please share any lessons learned, what to do, what you've found easiest, pics, etc. ? We picked up a 212 cc Semi-Trash Water Pump from Harbor Freight to utilize for filling faster, the totes are 275 gallons, will be painted black to keep algae down, if algae builds up will use a half cup of bleach or a little copper sulfate, will stack three pallets to set tote on, run a 2'-3" rv hose from tote to the trough and will have a float that's covered to keep critters from messing with it, trough will be smaller to keep anything from drowning in it.

What I really need is help with what connections have y'all found to work best?
Am I missing anything else?

Thanks in advance!!

Jared Zoch

[tsellars]

Following

[castlegaphunter]

in

[Blackmouth]

This

http://discussions.texasbowhunter.com/forums/showthread.php?t=462272

[SFZack]

I kept it simple. Dug a hole big enough to fit a 100 gallon trough, covered it with metal roofing material to prevent evaporation, as well as catch and direct additional rainfall. So far so good, about 1 year in.

[sharpstick35]

I have a similar setup on one of my blinds. I have a tote sitting on concrete blocks stacked 2 high. I catch water off of the blinds metal roof and supplement that with a similar pump and a tote in the truck. my water station is 40 yds away that is fed through a 1" poly line.

[SaintBlaise]

Smart has a different setup. His has a similar tank that runs to a trough. I wasn't able to find the link with a quick search. But, I've caught a few tips from that thread. You can use gold fish to keep your tank clean, and if you are using a tank (above ground) lay a stick in the tank hanging over the side. This will let the critters crawl out, so they won't be trapped.

[ken800]

You guys don't have problems with the water going stagnant? Maybe I need a bigger trough but the water in mine after sitting a short while starts to smell rotten.

[Blackmouth]

I know we are used to seeing large tanks for livestock but that is more of being able to provide surface space for a large number of animals for short amounts of time.

One thing you can do to reduce evaporation and keep the water cooler is to cover most of the trough like SFZack in the #5 post. Wildlife don't need much surface area to drink from and only a small amount actually needs to be exposed for the animal. Just don't make it so small that if something does get in (e.g. small wildlife) that they can't get out.

[SFZack]

I know we are used to seeing large tanks for livestock but that is more of being able to provide surface space for a large number of animals for short amounts of time.

One thing you can do to reduce evaporation and keep the water cooler is to cover most of the trough like SFZack in the #5 post. Wildlife don't need much surface area to drink from and only a small amount actually needs to be exposed for the animal. Just don't make it so small that if something does get in (e.g. small wildlife) that they can't get out.

I have a T-post in mine so that if small animals do get inside the trough, they can climb out. I have not had anything die inside of it in the year I have had it out. Digging the hole and having the trough "ground level" also helped lessen the amount of evaporation, because the lower ground is much cooler.
(I read this on the internet before I attempted, so it has to be true)

[Jzoch]

Thanks for the info fellas!!

Keep it coming.


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[CB_TxNole]

Bump

[donpablo]

We have one at our place and my brother is wanting to increase the size of the trough because he thinks it might encourage the deer and aoudad to frequent it more often. I don't think the size of the trough is going to make a difference but I guess we'll see.

[Henry66]

following

[Huntin Addict]

Here's what I did.

https://discussions.texasbowhunter.com/forums/showthread.php?t=312450&highlight=station