How to keep them cosy?

[Dwarfpotato]

This is my first winter with pigs. Tico and Cookie live indoors in my lounge. It's a big room (open plan downstairs) and I'm already spending a fortune on heating just to keep it warm enough for them. I don't have another room they can go in. I have a snugglesafe that I warm up but they spend all their time on it or under blankets so clearly the rest of the room isn't really warm enough.

This is their cage. It's 4x3 equivalent. The sides are about 70cm high.

What would be people's recommendations to heat just their bit? I'd rather not an oil filled radiator as it would end up heating the whole lounge. Other options I'm considering are a big wooden house with a tubular heater in (would take a long time to make. Might be a bit gloomy?) or a heat mat of some sort (would it only be warm when they sit on it?) I could put a duvet over their cage but it would be dark inside then, and I wouldn't get to see them

Pig tax from floor time yesterday when I was changing their fleece:

 

[Piggies&buns]

Do you know the temperature in the room?
Do you feel comfortable in there?
Do they feel warm when you touch them?

You can cover their cage with a blanket as that will help stop any draughts
Yes heat mats are only warm when they sit on them (they won’t heat the space)

 

[weepweeps]

I’m sure if you are warm enough in your house they will be too. Piggies feel more comfortable when they hide. They may not be cold just prefer to sit undercover. They are gorgeous.

 

[Dwarfpotato]

At the moment the room is 15 most of the day, 16 in the evening (I live on my own so bills are expensive). I have blankets for humans but pigs don't stay under them!

 

[Claire W]

Pigs are most comfortable between 15-20 degrees so if your house doesn’t drop below 15 degrees, they should be fine.

You can cover half their cage with a blanket to prevent draughts and May be add plenty of hay piles / cardboard boxes stuffed with hay that they can snuggle in to if you’re concerned

 

[AidaB]

Hi!
We have an old, hard to keep warm house. We average about 15C especially at night. This is our second winter with piggies.
We currently stuff one wooden house with hay for the boys if that’s how they want to stay warm. I also put in 2 fleece cubes(2 exits!) and squeeze a snuggle safe inside them. I sometimes find our boys sleeping in the loft like area(which is just covered with a blanket on top of the cage, other mornings I find them snuggled up on a heat pad. Hector likes to wriggle into the wooden house and sleep with his bum hanging out of the door! Perhaps the human equivalent of sticking a leg out of a duvet to cool down.
I also have 3sides of the cage covered in fleece to help with drafts.

I guess what I am saying is, the cooler room, doesn’t seem to bother them, but I make sure they have warmer spots to go if they want too.

 

[Merab]

Mine are indoor piggies and in these colder nights I add lots of extra hay.
They currently have 2 fleeces to sleep in.
One is being completely ignored ( it’s in the wrong corner!) the other is being sat on.
They sleep under the wooden hideys or under the hay.
There’s also a carrot cottage stuffed with hay and a paper bag stuffed with hay.

I have pegged some old towels around the cage where it’s against a wall to help with extra warmth

 

[Dwarfpotato]

That was a picture from when I only had one pig, in the summer. Right now they have two boxes, one with a snugglesafe in, and a fleece over the boxes so they can curl up under that if they like (they often do). Plus there's two grids making a tent with a towel over the top, and a cuddle cup inside. The cuddle cup is very popular! I gave them their snuggle sack and fleece tunnel and at most they get sat and pooped on... I'll make sure there's plenty of hay in all the boxes and hope that's enough! Thanks for all the replies and tips, everyone

 

[LollyJJ]

Hi, this is what my set up looks like at the moment- my 2 boars are downstairs in my house and it is definitely cooler in there at night than it is upstairs. There's a hard floor in the room. I just add lots of blankets - some I clip on to the grids to make hammocks and they snuggle up inside them (as modelled by Pedro in the photo) or just drape them over their furniture. As you can see there's a big blanket over the top at the back and that goes all the way down to the ground. I also have some pieces of cardboard to go up the sides in some of the corners to create more hideys/draught proofing.
And of course the 2 hayboxes are piled high, perfect to cosy into!