Preparing For The Heat

Today is forecast to be quite a bit hotter than usual for this time of year. It normally wouldn’t be the end of the world, but lately one of the reasons our Mummy Pig has been getting out of her pen is to have a mud bath. To try to stop this today I’ve put in place a few things to keep her in. The sheep and calves get free range of the paddock, so they just find some shade to keep their cool and aren't an issue.

Forecast for today is 100F/38C, and already at 10am we're above average for Nov

One of the first jobs I started last night - making some big ice blocks! I figure that later today when the heat really comes in, I can add these to her pen or drinking water to help cool her down.  The blocks are only the size of take away food containers but they needed to be in the freezer overnight to be cold enough today.

This morning’s priorities were to clean out her drinking water to give her some cold, fresh water.  She has a concrete water trough so when it gets mud etc in it, it can be very difficult to clean out.  I deliberately left it to go low yesterday to have a solid clean out (or a clean out of the solids!) and to refill it with clean water.

Clean Drinking Water

Next up was a mud bath.  Not having a mud bath isn’t usually an issue,  but since pigs can’t sweat,  it is their way to cool off in the heat.  Previously Mummy Pig would tip her drinking water out to make her own mud.  By deliberately flooding a patch of dirt for her I get to control were the mud bath is.  Hopefully keeping her in the pen at the same time!

Mud, Glorious Mud

Finally, when I feed her today, I’ll also spray her down with water,  top up the drinking water (with ice too) and the mud bath.  This way she shouldn’t get out and make her own mud bath in the cow & lambs drinking water!

How do you keep your livestock cool in the heat?