Feel better soon Wiebke!
Today was a success, the temperature in the piggy room stayed a good 6 degrees below what was going on outside with just the cardboard up on the windows. They were introduced to their granite chopping boards and seem to have decided they're safe, being a bit perplexed at first
water bottles are all frozen ready to go tomorrow, and a new batch ready to go in the freezer as soon as those are out to serve their purpose.
From what I can see, I only have about 6 hours to worry about both days, with the rest of the day only being as warm as today. I may break my rule of not leaving windows open over night on Monday, as I doubt I'll be sleeping much anyway and 22c overnight is asking a bit much of the pigs after such a warm day.
Only open the windows once outdoors is cooler than indoors (hopefully around 3-5 am or in an inner city maybe not possible at all). Monday night is going to horrible. We are in the red zone, too.
But I hope that having been able to try and test things you would have never considered beforehand gives you a bit more of a chance.
The other things that you may want to do for the nonstop heat:
- put all your snugglesafes in the fridge and use them as additional coolers in the marathon. They are cool, not cold and will last only 2-3 hours but they can help with topping and fill gaps. They are also gentler for oldies; just one out and the other in the fridge.
- Any extra cooling elements (like from cool boxes) can go in the freezer. Make sure that you can set up a 'relay' of cooling elements so you always have something out and something freezing/cooling down and ready to replace any warmed elements, which can then go back too cooling. You are looking at a nonstop heat from tomorrow 7 am until the early hours of Wednesday. The days will have a strong breeze coming straight out of an oven with will stop at sundown and the night will have no air movement at all so your house/flat won't have any chance to cool and you need to continue to keep yourself and your piggies as cool as possible throughout the night.
- Fill an extra jug or two with water and keep it in the fridge for yourself. Plain water and tea are better thirst quenchers than any sugary drinks. Keep sipping away steadily and
do not bolt a big glass or bottle of ice cold stuff down in one go, as much as you are tempted - you do not want to have a nasty tummy upset on top of heat exhaustion. Done that as a teenager in the 80ies when we had our first near 40 C day in Switzerland. It wasn't pleasant.
- If you yourself are very hot and are having a heat headache, dampen a scarf and wind it around your head to help cool down your brain (especially when not working in public services). The trick with the evaporating water cooling has got lots of other practical applications...
- Make the best of the still cooler night tonight and follow the BBC weather advice to leave all possible windows and doors open ideally overnight or until you go to bed and air and do the same first thing in the morning if you had to close them while asleep. Then close everything, pull any curtains and anything you can do to keep the sun from getting into your home; once closed, the sealed indoors can only heat up so much; that is simple physics. It will be stifling but much safer.
If you leave the windows or even just a flap on the shade side open, you'll allow a hot breeze of over 50 C in and make things a lot worse instead of better. There won't be anything in the way of a cool breeze until Wednesday.
BBC Weather - Home
- have regular luke warm showers or hold your wrists under a cold tap when you are overheating. A cold foot bath also helps to cool you down.
All the best! Temperatures will go down more in the countryside but not much in cities.
I won't be coming on here over the next few days.
according to my thermometer .
just refilled their water bottles too and they're getting increasingly irate because none of these visits are producing food, lol. 22.6 in there for the time being.
We had ours for 4/5 years now. We got it because of the piggies too. We had a teddy breed of piggy that time (Bunny) that struggled with heat during that summer. So hubby decided to buy a portable aircon, because electric fans and air coolers really weren't enough. Hubby and I are sharing the benefit of it too. 