Setting up water in a stock containment area in Victoria

A stock containment area is a set of small, permanent, stock-proof yards where sheep or cattle are held during drought, after a fire or flood, or to rest paddocks. Agriculture Victoria publishes guidance on the water side of it. The figures below are theirs; the comments on what they mean day to day are ours.

How much water the stock need

Agriculture Victoria's Table 3 gives peak and average demand per head per day:

Stock type	Peak demand (L/head/day)	Average demand (L/head/day)
Dry sheep	10	6
Lactating ewes	14	10
Weaner lambs	6	4
Dry cattle	100	80
Lactating cattle	120	100
Weaner calves	70	55

Demand swings with the season. The same guidance notes a mature sheep on dry feed might use 8 to 10 litres a day in summer and less than 4 litres a day in winter, and that consumption is also affected by feed type, walking distance, shade, and the quality and temperature of the water.

Flow rate and storage

The supply needs to deliver the daily peak demand within 4 hours so every animal gets a chance to drink. Agriculture Victoria's worked examples: 21 litres a minute for 500 dry sheep, and 67 litres a minute for 160 dry cattle. The system should ideally be gravity fed with at least 4 days of storage in reserve.

Trough size

For 500 sheep or 160 cattle, the guidance describes a suitable trough as having 8 to 10 metres of accessible trough edge and 400 to 600 litres of storage. Edge length matters more than volume: confined stock drink together, and a long shallow trough gives more of them a place at once.

Cleaning

This is the part that becomes a daily job. The guidance is direct: skim surface material daily, and completely empty, clean and refill troughs every 1 to 2 days. It also describes the trough that makes this easiest: long and shallow, with a smooth internal profile, a gate valve and a large outlet.

Two ways to meet that standard. Build the cleaning round into someone's day, with a trough designed to tip and scrub quickly. Or use a trough that does the empty-and-refill itself on a schedule. We supply the second kind, the SATURN self-flushing trough, and offer a 90-day on-farm trial in Victoria so you can judge it against your own containment area rather than our description of it.

Water quality checklist from the guidance

• Fresh, cool and clean; low in salt, organic matter and suspended clay
• Free of blue-green algae, heavy metals and chemical residues
• If in doubt, send a sample to a water testing laboratory
• Stock avoid water that is warm, stagnant, polluted with food residue, or has dust or straw on the surface