Products You Never Knew Existed

[Sundae]

And they're not mouldy either.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by Sundae

And they're not mouldy either.

Mouldy? that's sic.

[Gravdigr]

$6 fer squirrel panties?!

[glatt]

I've seen cows standing around a big tub of water in a pasture, drinking away.

I had never seen one of these before yesterday.

It's clearly for the cows, and they clearly use it. I don't know how they learn to use it though. They press their noses against the balls, and press them down into their holes, into the water. They have to use a bit of force, because the balls have buoyancy and are not small. It's kind of hard to push them in. But once you push them down, there's plenty of water down in there. When you let go of them, they pop right back up into place, so the inside has to be shaped to guide the balls back into the hole.

I'm not sure what the point is. Prevent evaporation? Keep small animals and deer out? Keep it clean? The water was actually kind of dirty with cud and cow backwash in it.

How do they learn that there is water in there? The younger ones can see the older ones doing it, I'm sure, but how was that first cow trained?

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by glatt

I'm not sure what the point is. Prevent evaporation? Keep small animals and deer out? Keep it clean?

Ptobably all that plus mosquitoes.

How do they learn that there is water in there? The younger ones can see the older ones doing it, I'm sure, but how was that first cow trained?

They probably left them out there for a few weeks without the balls at first.

[glatt]

Originally Posted by glatt

I'm not sure what the point is. Prevent evaporation? Keep small animals and deer out? Keep it clean? The water was actually kind of dirty with cud and cow backwash in it.

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

Ptobably all that plus mosquitoes.

I Googled it.

We're both wrong. It keeps the water from freezing over in the winter.

[glatt]

Originally Posted by glatt

I Googled it.

We're both wrong. It keeps the water from freezing over in the winter.

And I was just able to look up this particular model. And at the risk of looking way to excited about this, it's really pretty cool.

You run a water line to this thing, and a float controlled valve, much like a float in the back of your toilet, fills the tank from below. Since you are running the water to it underground, below the frost line, it doesn't freeze in the winter, even in cold climates. The livestock just have to be actively using it so that the cold water in the tank is constantly being replaced by fresh water from the relatively warm underground pipe. In the summer, that same underground pipe means the water is cooler for the cows. And the balls keep the water temperature fairly constant.

The one I saw was about 300 yards uphill from the nearest building that had an obvious water supply, but I suppose you can run a hose underground for 300 yards. There was a dilapidated shed about 80 yards from this watering tank, and maybe the plumbing came from that shed.