Bird baths can be a great addition to your garden, especially if you have a bird table nearby, but they can also be trouble. They freeze up easily, which typically results in your fresh water turning into ice.
It’s important that you ensure that your bird bath stays free of ice during the winter months, but that doesn’t mean simply adding boiling hot water to it every day.
There are some simple steps that you can take to prevent ice from forming on the sides of your bird bath and also a few other ways of keeping water flowing too!
The method you use depends on how much time you have, how much money you want or can spend and what materials you want to use. You may want to experiment with some combinations of these tips to come up with the best solution for your situation!
Our Top Tips
Don’t let the water freeze over completely
Check your bird bath for frozen spots every couple of days – if it has frozen on one spot or two, then there is no point in waiting for it to freeze all the way. If the bird bath water freezes completely, it can damage your basin. This could potentially lead to mould and even leaks. Therefore, whatever you do, don’t allow this to happen.
Use a heater
You can use a heat source to help prevent ice from forming around the sides of your bird bath in the winter months. An electric heater will be better than an oil-filled heater, as it won’t take up too much space, should last a little longer, and provide more heat per watt.
Additionally, if you have a patio heater in your garden, placing the bird bath under it will keep the water warm when it’s in use and keep it mostly ice-free.
Heated mat
You can also buy a heated bird bath mat to place under the base of your bird bath. If you want to ensure that freezing cold water stays warmer, this is a great idea and can help keep your backyard birds happy too.
Keep snow off
This is an important tip. If you want to keep your bird bath free of ice, try to keep snow off it. Don’t let snow sit around the side of your bird bath or on top of it. If you do this, it can freeze onto the surface and then form ice crystals!
Placing something on top
This works well for larger bird baths that have a flat surface area at the top. You can simply place an object at least the size of a plate on the top of your bird bath and cover it with a lid. This will help to prevent water from draining into the bird bath and becoming frozen.
Try a floating de-icer
An alternative to salt mentioned above would be to buy a device called a floating de-icer which will keep the water surface from freezing over.
It usually costs under £10 and is easy to install. The great thing about these is that they are relatively cheap and highly effective.
Keep the water moving
The water in your bird bath should always be moving, especially in the winter months. A simple solution is to try and ensure that there is a consistent movement of your bird bath water which can be easily achieved when the wind blows.
Try placing a small movable object such as a small ball, cork, or a slightly larger ping pong ball in your water vessel. This will create small ripples and stop the bird bath from freezing. This will help prevent ice from forming and leave wild birds and other wildlife with a fresh supply of ice-free water to drink.
Place it in a sunny spot
You’ll probably want your bird bath in a shady spot when it’s not freezing cold outside. However, during winter, to stop it from freezing, try to make the most of natural heat sources, such as the sun. Make sure that your bird bath is positioned in a sunny area – this will help to keep the water from freezing, and it will also help to warm it up a bit too. Even during harsh winter conditions, there are spates of sunshine.
The sun, even when it’s cold outside, can melt frozen water. Finding sunny areas (especially in small gardens) is an option that won’t be available for everyone.
Buy a heated bird bath
If you want to go all the way, you can buy a heated bird bath. This is typically a heated basin containing hot water that will heat up if needed. It typically costs around £50 and requires no additional maintenance beyond plugging it in – they also work well for smaller bird baths as well!
Darken the surface
If you can, add some dark material to the surface of your bird bath. This will help it to insulate heat so that water will be more likely to stay unfrozen. This can work exceptionally well if you add a black plastic sheet, a black plate, or a solar blanket to the top of your bird bath.
However, it is important to note that anything too thick could trap heat and make the air temperature in your yard too warm, which could melt the ice.
Avoid chemicals
It is tempting to add chemicals to help prevent freezing; you may have even seen people do this, and it could perhaps seem a logical solution to some. However, this isn’t a good idea. Anti-freeze is deadly to birds and should be avoided at all costs. Also, certain chemicals could damage your bird bath and negatively affect the wild birds that drink from it.
Bird bath and pond anti-freeze
You can add some bird-friendly anti-freeze to the bird bath water – one that is non-toxic. This will help to keep the bird bath from freezing without any negative side effects. This is another option that isn’t too expensive and is relatively easy to do.
Using a solar heater with your bird bath
Similar to the above-mentioned heated bird baths, you can fit a solar panel heater on your bird bath, and it will keep the water warm through freezing winds and cold weather. The amount of heat the solar heater will provide depends on how large the panel is.
Depending on the size of the bath and how long cold snaps last in your area should determine how many panels and how much heat is required.
Use a polythene sheet
You can also wrap a polythene sheet around your bird bath to try and prevent it from freezing. Although it may not stop the bird bath from freezing very effectively, you can simply lift the sheet out and discard the ice when it does freeze. Place the sheet back in and repeat the process after any freezing temperatures. This is an affordable and easy solution that works well in most situations.
Move it onto your patio area overnight
You can try moving your bird bath onto your patio overnight. You will have a better chance of keeping it unfrozen if it is closer to the home, where heat from the house may keep it slightly warmer. Additionally, if you have a fire pit in your garden or patio, keep the bird bath nearby to help keep the water temperature up.
Move it into your garage
If possible, you can also bring your bird bath into your garage overnight. This is an easy way to keep your bird bath from freezing unless the cold temperatures are extremely low over a succession of days and nights. It also allows you to clean and perform winter maintenance of your bird bath indoors.
Install a fountain
An alternative to a bird bath is to use a fountain. This will provide winter birds with the water they need and keep it from freezing. The water in the fountain should be moving too, so make sure that you set up the fountain in such a way to cause it to run constantly.
Solar bird bath fountains
Solar bird bath fountains are great because they absorb solar heat, are a cheaper alternative to the above, and keep water flowing. They may not keep your bird bath warm, but they keep the water flowing so can prevent the freezing process.
Summary
No matter which of the above methods you choose to keep your bird bath ice-free, if done effectively and regularly, you should see good results.
Also, it is important to keep an eye on the condition of it and make sure that everything is working smoothly by doing regular checks on your bath and basin. If there are any problems, it is best to fix them quickly before they get out of hand.
So there you go – a few tips (and some information) about keeping your bird bath from freezing.
Additional Resources
Sources and References
- 6 Easy Tips To Keep Your Bird Bath From Freezing – farmersalmanac.com
Sam loves to learn about animals and their habitats. He has been a nature lover from a very young age, and has been writing papers and articles about wildlife for as long as he can remember.