Problem number 1: Our chickens are dumb… really dumb. I swear they’d be extinct if they didn’t taste so good (for the record, we don’t slaugher our chickens). They scratch inside their coop all day long. The problem is, they toss dirt in their waterers and make mud in the base even though it is elevated off the ground. It gets pretty disgusting, and they run out of water quickly. We’re all tired of cleaning the muck out so the chickees may drink.
Problem number 2: I hate dragging hoses all over the property. They kink. They are heavy. They clobber my plants around corners. They also put out scorching hot water all summer. Water is wasted clearing the lines until cooler water flows through.
We’re fed up.
Solution: install water lines/spigots closer to the garden and at the chicken coop.
Problem number 3: we have a lot of land and that’s a lot of digging. I thought I could find the existing line that runs up to the house but I dug, and dug, and dug and couldn’t find it.
Solution: Joe rented a trencher!
That thing is a beast! It cut through the limestone driveway in a heartbeat. It did struggle some on the roots of trees on the way up to the coop.
Once the trenches were dug from the well to the two terminal destinations, Joe laid PEX pipe down. The reason he chose this method is because the pipe is one, continuous, flexible pipe. He can bend it to change direction without having to cut and glue angles. To connect two pipes, he crimps the lines using a SharkBite clamp.
We filled the holes back in, tamped them down, and filled them some more. Joe placed an in-ground faucet box near the garden and will install the faucet at the chicken coop soon. It will be so much easier than dragging water hoses and carrying muddy chicken waterers over to the spigot. Eventually, we’ll install self-waterers… but this is a massive step in the right direction.
