The Field Calculators → Stock
Stock
Livestock water demand
Daily water for the animals — the number that sizes your tank, your pump and your winter worry.
Result
Dairy cows (in milk)1
Beef cattle0
Horses0
Sheep / goats0
Pigs0
Chickens12
Hot weather multiplier1 ×
Daily water
32 gal/day
Per week
221 gal
Tank for 3 days
95 gal
Three days is a reasonable buffer against a pump failure.
Continuous flow to keep up
0.02 gal/min
Compare that against your well's tested recovery rate.
What this will not do
- Stock can't tell you the tank is empty. A float valve plus a level sensor plus an alarm is the whole system, and the alarm is the part that matters — a water failure in summer heat is measured in hours, not days.
- In winter the problem inverts: the de-icer that quietly stopped drawing current. Put a current clamp on that circuit; voltage at the outlet tells you nothing about whether the element is alive.
- These are planning averages. Lactating animals, hot weather, and dry feed all push consumption up hard.
The full build and the reasoning are in Chapter 30 of the guide.