Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Home made fish feeder??

I have an old deer feeder and thought about turning it into a fish feeder. What do you guys think. It should work. I want to make it into something like a bird house or something so it ant a sore eye. Ant idea would help.

I put an Americn Hunter under a 55 gallon barrel. I put a plastic "skirt" that went around and 10" below the opening to both protect from moisture and "drop" the feed in a small area enclosed with a 10' square "ring" of 3/4" pvc.. I also gave 5/8-3/4" clearance on the spinner plate to prevent a clog. It has worked flawlessly for 5 years now (2 for deer and 3 for fish).
Inside the barrel I put a funnel so all feed gets used and no worries of mold. It sets on a tripod over a drop-off on a submerged island. I sunk a small, thinned cedar in the drop-off too. I also use a solar charger and the digital timer slings 5 seconds 3 times a day, 8am/pm and 2 pm. I have the bottom of the timer 15" abovr the water surface. I the second picture you will see the one and only problem I've had---I set the feeder about 2 feet too low and it was submerged for a while when the pond filled. I dried all the electronics and it still worked although the LED screen is a little less bright now.

"Special" treat feeding time after an alum application.


Oops!

Rainman, I did the same thing with a 2nd feeder I put up 2 weeks ago. The pond had 10 inches in 3 days, 5 in a few hrs. Saturday early AM. I strung a cable across the pond and hung the feeder about 3 ft. above the water. I 'eyeballed' the height of it compared to the spillway. I did about as good a job as the dozer operator; the water went over the other side of dam from spillway. Oop!

I hope your feeder didn't have 200 pounds of fresh feed like mine. I eyeballed mine too and was WAY off. That large exposed rock top on the far shore is almost 2 feet under water at full pool. It was a LOT of fun getting that full, wet feeder out of the water in that little bass buggy in the pic. I ended up tying a rope around the top of the barrel to the back of the boat then extended it to the farm truck and told the kids to it pull forward, fortunately it tipped over into the boat right where it wa supposed to. Sure was glad I taught them how to drive a stick

Hey Guys, time to invest in a laser level.

Rainman, I also have an American Hunter deer feeder rigged similar to yours and it's worked great, the only thing I added was to epoxy a 5 inch piece of coat hangar in the center of the spinner plate sticking up into the feed barrel, just incase of a clog.

I did invest in the laser level, that's how I KNOW te height above the water now!

I thought about the coat hanger idea but was worried more about the extra drag on the motor and burning it out.

If you haven't had any problems then no need for the wire, I just wanted to be safe cause I don't live at my pond, I'm 95 miles away.
The wire is dead center of the plate, with just a tiny bend at the top and no problems after 2 years.

Native outdoors has the Aquapro adf-25dx with battery and solar panel for $89.95, thinking of getting it cause I'll need the old feeder for the fish cage I'm building. I don't think they had a problem with that model.

adf-25dx is the same as 150dx and they have revamped the motor on it. It will be about 60 days until the new motor is avial Im told. I suggest waiting until then to get the new style.

Thanks for the info Greg, on second thought I thing I'll get a small fish feeder for the cage so that I can put something over it to keep the Racoons and other varmits out.

Argh... orderd one today. Too late to cancel.

bobad, hopefully you won't have a problem, but if you do it seems like the company is making good on the problem.