I read somewhere last year about putting a small chunk off a chlorine pool tablet in each bucket. I started doing it, and have no algae issues at all anymore. Stay clean, and it's cheap.
how big of a chunk and how big are your buckets, 5gal?
i use the 50gal rubbermaid troughs for my dogs and it takes about a wk for the bottoms to turn green. i will dump the water, pressure wash them and sometimes add a half pint of chlorine bleach and fill the trough and let the water overflow till i have just bare hint of bleach smell in the water and move onto the next trough.
the trough with my red cur and blue tick pup doesn't algae as fast as the 1 with 1 of my other curs, which I'm sure it stems from him pissing in it regularly, plus he will jump in it (even in the colder winter months and no matter where i put the trough) if I'm in the pig pen tending the hogs or working a pup, so I'm sure with all his jumping around and tracking poo on his feet.
any thoughts as to keeping him from jumping it? iv thought about screwing a sheet of plywood and cutting a hole in just big enough for him to get his head in to drink (cheaper in cost) or a sheet of expanded steel (still allows for rain to fill it up and ease of washing it out but costly). also, any thoughts on how to keep him from pissing it? ( the plywood would prevent most of it from getting in the water, but not all
Some 5 gallons, some one gallons. I put a decent chunk, 1/2"x1/2", in the 5 gallon, and it lasts a couple weeks. Put a smaller piece, 1/4"x1/4" in the smaller buckets and it lasts about the same. Not exact measurements, just depends in how the tablet chunks up when broken. Just don't put it in galvanized buckets, it rusts them bad.
