I have literally like four digital thermometers, but whenever I pull one out to use it, even if it’s new, it always says low battery.
Anyone have a special brand or type they use that they recommend that holds battery life that I can keep in my trunk that will hold juice for when I need it?
Any battery operated device shouldn’t be left where it can be exposed to cold temps. Cold kills batteries.
it’s a climate controlled area
get an old-fashioned mercury thermometer 
They’re also more accurate over months and years, than digitals
But yeah, heat and cold greatly reduce battery life. That said, we have an external thermometer that goes with our heat pump, to tell the heat pump when it’s cold enough outside to not bother trying, but to switch to the auxillary heat. It’s a whole different type of battery, lithium, designed for longer life out in the heat and cold. I don’t know if that type of battery exists in the size needed for the digital thermometers but you could check. They still need to be changed, but it’s about a year, not months.
Is it just an L that comes up when you first turn it on? I think that may be for low temp, not low battery. But it’s been years since I gave up on digital and went back to glass so my memory may be faulty.
Our barn has a cheap Walgreens brand digital thermometer. It gets more use than the typical single horse owner’s thermometer, but it’s been working for some time. It’s stored in our laundry/supply room so warmer than a tack trunk, but not super climate controlled. I guess temps can affect batteries, but I keep an inexpensive digital tire gauge in my car’s glove box. It can get extremely hot or cold in my midwest state, but it’s been working for over 6 years and I’ve yet to change the battery.
My duck digital thermometer has always worked fine. I got it on sale at Meijers, thinking the bright yellow color would be easy to locate after setting it down or in the first aid box. Everyone here KNOWS Ducky is the HORSE thermometer. I do keep a new battery in the first aid box, should the old one go bad. I keep the box in a tack room that is kept about 50F all winter.
Any mercury rhermometers should be double checked against another thermometer for accuracy in degrees it shows. I bought a couple mercury thermometers (they had the eye for a string to clip on a tail) at TSC that read very high!! Totally inaccurate. Other folks here on COTH warned me about them being cheaply made, not being accurate, so I returned them.
I hear you on this.
I have an old BD digital thermometer that is 15+ years old and just recently had the battery die.
I tried to just replace it with a new thermometer— hahahahahaha. I went through about half a dozen thermometers. None of them could survive barn life and more than a couple uses.
So I just replaced the battery in the old BD thermometer. Good as new.
But, I did buy a Walgreens one over the summer. So far it has lasted and it is FAST and seemingly accurate. The speed of it is really nice. Not that digital thermometers are slow, but this Walgreens one gives an accurate temp in seconds.
I’ve had one of these for literally twenty years
I’ve replaced the battery ONCE. It lives in the barn, I don’t baby it at all. It just always works.
Highly recommend!
I think I’m going to get one of these. I still have an ancient mercury veterinary thermometer, but digital is so much faster. This year alone, I’ve purchased three digital thermometers, trying to achieve a consensus on a horse’s temp. For the money, I could have one of these, instead.
I have a cheap digital (no battery)that is a PITA to use.
Allowing for age - probably near 10yrs - it takes 4Ever to register.
My 30+yo mercury is still working just fine.
And has a loop I can put baling twine through so it can’t get “lost” 
For batteries in flashlights, blood pressure monitors, I take a baggie and a rubber and and remove the batteries from the battery, put in them into the baggie and use the rubber and to loop the baggie to the flashlight.
It’s not the battery replacement I worry about, but the corrosion of the battery and its effect on the flashlight (rust, breakdown) that’s more important.
Autocorrect strikes again!
I’m sure you typed “rubberband”, but Auto Knows Better fixed it for you 
I was wondering how you used the condom (colloquial: rubber) 
Autocorrupt!
Lol a rubber would probably work too!
I have a solar thermometer. It’s hardy and it always works no matter how long it sits.
This was my first thought too. Even the one I keep in the house for human use says LO when first turned on, it means low temperature, not low batteries.
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