Ways to keep water from freezing

[MadMango]

Hey guys,

Had my first, and unfortunately unsuccessful hunting trip last weekend. I learned a few things though, one thing I didn't account for was keeping my water from freezing during the night, and even day. My method was to melt some bottles at night next to the fire and sleep with them in my bag, but I'd prefer to not do that anymore. Any tips?

[BRvalley]

a cooler/insulated jug will help, boil some water before bed and dump it in, wrap extra jacket/blanket over it

if you are truck camping, i've read posts on the overland/truck forums about guys using a little aerator....but for me boiling water and the insulated jug works well enough

[TimberPig]

Larger bottles don’t freeze as easily, so bringing a jug instead of a pack of small bottles will help.

Depending upon temps and your setup, leaving them in your vehicle will keep them from freezing if it is only a couple below zero. -10 or colder for most of the night they need to be kept in a place that doesn’t freeze as even big jugs will freeze up in those temps. In those temps, RV, cabin or tent with heater or they’ll be popsicles.

[Fella]

I was hunting last weekend when that cold snap hit the Princeton area, -5 was the high most days with temps dipping to -23 one night. We were sleeping in a summer tent. For our main jug we built a little hut out of some foam insulation we brought. Kept the jug from freezing, just had to melt the ice in the spigot which I did by heating a tent peg with a tiger torch and sticking it into the spigot. For our water bottles, we just buried them in a snow drift. No issues with frozen water at all.

[MadMango]

I am car camping, and what I think I will try next time is just get a smaller cooler for keeping the water in, heat up some at night to put in there and maybe dump all the hand warmers from the day into the cooler as well. Burying some bottles in the snow might have been a good move too, but although it was -11 at night, there wasnt that much snow cover in the camp to bury anything in.

[Edzzed]

Put them in a netted bag and submerge them in a creek. Never tried it but others might know if it will work.

[two-feet]

In cold weather i bring a thermos of tea that i make in the morning, i then will pour each cup 1/2 full and add snow till the cup is full. This doubles my liquid from 1L to 2L.

[dak0ta]

Add salt or sugar to your water and it'll decrease the freezing point similar to how salt on the roads prevents ice formation on roads. Grade 11 chemistry!

[caddisguy]

Insulation!

Insulation keeps the cocoa hot and the koolaid cool

Cooler is best but sleeping bags, clothing bags, backpacks all work "to a degree" :)

[Nimrod]

Put your water in a cooler with some kind of heat sink.
if you have a fire in the evening take an extra rock from the proximity, so long as you can touch it bare handed, put it in the cooler.
will keep the temperature in the cooler above freezing for a long time.
I don't like having my food cooler in the wall tent, I'll toss a chuck of wood from the wood pile from inside the tent in the cooler in the evening, keeps the milk from freezing.

[tigrr]

Pour the water in the coffee pot before bed. Heat the pot and make coffee in the morning. A block of wood sitting beside the fire thaws out a case of beer and water bottles!! Nothing worse that coming back to a frozen slushy beer at the end of a long hard day. Camp by a stream for running water. I'm still learning too at 60.

[HappyJack]

hunting -25c we put water in some pots before it was all frozen and just thawed it out on the stove in the morning to make coffee.

[boilerroom]

backpackers tip: boil water at night and put in Nalgene water bottles. Use these as foot warmers in sleeping bag wrapped in long underwear. In the morning, undies are warm and water has cooled for drinking or reboiling for coffee, etc.

[nature girl]

I dont know if this will work but came to me if it is small water bottles how about taking some wool socks and putting the water bottles in the wool socks.

[PrecariousPhoto]

I find a 50/50 mix of water/vodka works well.

[wideopenthrottle]

hot (but not too hot) rocks in a metal pot in a cooler you don't care about

[tigrr]

That water bottle in a wool sock in the bottom of my sleeping bag sounds kind of interesting. If you forget to put water in the coffee pot.
I always stay by a stream. Washing, cooking, washing and boiling for coffee is important.

[Retiredguy]

I find a 50/50 mix of water/vodka works well.

A seasoned veteran! It's amazing what you can come up with if you put a little thought into it, isn't it? ;)