freezing water

I give up, how long?

Probably as long as a bucket of cold water with a warm brick dropped in it.
Horses will also learn water time, just like feed time and come drink when you bring out the bucket.
Also any boyscout has enough sense not to heat wet or damp rocks and bricks. That have been immersed in water.

So... I know this seems contrary to common sense, but water actually freezes faster if it is warm and put into a freezing environment. We have tried this actually... ran hot tap water (which, here is still cool enough to consider "shower water", haha)... it froze faster than the buckets with the "normal" water out of our hydrants :/


Lol

In my experience (even having electricity in our barn), it is more cost effective, more environmentally friendly and less wasteful to carry water buckets out and fill tanks as needed. We check a few times a day... put a 6 gallon bucket per horse in each tank - when it freezes, we dump, refill. Because we only give 6 gallons/horse, we usually don't end up dumping too much, and no one is left thirsty :) But... then again, ALL of our time is spent at the farm, so checking water tanks every two hours isn't a big deal to us...

Less than an hour gunslinger! Joe, if I read the post correctly, a box was built & insulated and had an opening to put the heated bricks under the bucket, not in the water or touching the bucket because if you were using plastic & set the bucket directly on top, it would melt. Reminds me of a funny story from years ago, bear with me, I am becoming an old lady with many stories....I was carrying a bucket of water to the kids' pony, was around -30C. It was mild the day before so the ground was a sheet of ice. I slipped, spilled the bucket and my sweatpants froze me to the ground!
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try carring 10 to 14 buckets out a day for a month... in 3 foot snow... below 0.. its not easier..

Our barn also uses soccer balls in the water buckets outside, so the horses can push it around to break the ice. They also break the ice every now and then and strain the ice out with a tennis racket.

Inside the barn, they have purchased insulated water bucket holders for a five gallon bucket holder. You can also use heated water buckets or the heating elements for the big outdoor troughs. Also, for a water supplier another barn uses a big water drum and made a box that goes over it, then they stuff it with hay/straw/rags and it keeps the water unfrozen.

Of course, if you have power, I won't bother playing around with bricks & whatnot. Flash forward to present times, I have a unfreezable water hydrant & power for a stock tank deicer, I did my dues packing buckets of water.