Inventively Trashy 2

Bulldogs overheat very easily. One might argue that they are not the ideal camp dogs. However, my camp is up north on a lake and even in the middle of the summer on the hottest days, I've been able to keep the dogs cool.

Except this year. There have been several hot days that have been unbearable and I have spent a lot of time worrying about my dogs and the heat, while dunking them in the lake, using wet towels to cool them down and squirting cold bottles of water into their mouths.

This morning, after getting Griffin wet (which he didn't enjoy), I couldn't handle the panting anymore and I brought both of them to the health center (which is the one air conditioned building at camp). I expected that they would enjoy the cool building, but they reacted like they were being held captive in a prison. I didn't think the nurse would really appreciate the screeching, so they didn't last very long (even though they were cool).


A few years ago, two big air conditioners were donated to camp. Unfortunately all of the windows in my house slide open and so you can't put an air conditioner in the window. There aren't any other buildings that they would fit either, so they've just been sitting in storage.

Until today. I pulled one out and plugged it in (and determined it worked) and then I decided I would figure out some way to get it to cool down some area of my house so I could cool the dogs down. This photo is of my laundry room and back door. Property Manager Tom gave me some foam board to fill the rest of the door and I shoved towels in the cracks to insulate it. This photo captures almost the entire small hallway, which is now pleasantly cool.

This is the least energy efficient, most trashy-looking solution to the problem, but it made the dogs stop panting and I'm hoping there won't be many more hot days so I won't need to use this very often.

Just another day in the life of camp dogs...