mad dogs go out in the midday sun

Here are the first few lines of the old song, Mad Dogs and Englishmen by Noel Coward :

In tropical climes there are certain times of day
When all the citizens retire,
to tear their clothes off and perspire.
It's one of those rules that the biggest fools obey,
Because the sun is much too sultry and one must avoid
its ultry-violet ray --
Papalaka-papalaka-papalaka-boo. (Repeat)
Digariga-digariga-digariga-doo. (Repeat)
The natives grieve when the white men leave their huts,
Because they're obviously, absolutely nuts --
Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun.
The Japanese don't care to, the Chinese wouldn't dare to,
Hindus and Argentines sleep firmly from twelve to one,
But Englishmen detest a siesta,
In the Philippines there are lovely screens,
to protect you from the glare,
In the Malay states there are hats like plates,
which the Britishers won't wear,
At twelve noon the natives swoon, and
no further work is done -
But Mad Dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun.

And here is Penny, at twenty minutes past noon today. (40 degrees Celcius/ 104 Fahrenheit)

Has she gone mad? Probably not, but she's a glutton for fun with her Whirl Wheel.

I ordered her inside! (BTW, the plants are covered to try to stop them frizzling in the extended horrible heat.)

Now she's relaxing in front of the fan, and I'm hot and bothered in the next room because I'm too kind (or soft) to deprive her of the fan.

But this morning, early, we walked at Willsmere and she had a lovely swim with her toy. Two toys, actually.

It was cool in the shade of the trees. Thank God for old, established trees!

frozen food and tricks

Now that the hot weather has finally hit, it's time to think of some entertainment in the house.

For one thing, I've frozen half a can of food for Penny to eat tonight. (My favorite brand is ZiwiPeak, from New Zealand.

And I made a discovery. I just can't throw anything out, and those little tinfoil patty pans that Christmas mince pies come in looked as if they might be useful. I was planning to try putting them around seedlings because I've heard that snails don't like sliding over the metallic feel of aluminium foil. But in the present heat I think the reflected heat would cook the little plants.

But the foil pans are just the right size to cover a half-used can of dog food.





And I think it might be just the weather to practise some tricks in the house instead of being outside in the heat. I don't know if we could conquer such a demanding one as Johann's 'suitcase trick', though.

dogs keeping cool on a hot day

Scruffy visited yesterday. He had been clipped and looked great, in my opinion, though his human thinks he looks better with a long coat. (I've posted about his visits previously here and here.)



We're experiencing strangely hot weather for Spring (12 degrees above average!) so the dogs took it easy.

a dog visits Darebin Parklands in the heat

In the cool hours after dawn Penny and I headed for Darebin Parklands to see how the plants and animals have made it through the current heat wave.



One of the first sights was a eucalypt that had dropped one of its branches.

Eucalypts are one of the most common trees in the Parklands and I wondered whether there will be more dropping of limbs if this heat continues, so I had a look around the Internet. I found it surprisingly difficult to locate information from Australia, but I suppose that reflects two realities - the dominance of the English-speaking net by the US and the number of eucalypts growing in the US.

Page 5 of the Danville Weekly of 2006 had an article about 'sudden limb drop syndrome.' They'd been having a twelve-day heat wave - temperatures above 100 degrees for nearly two consecutive weeks. Sounds even worse than here. (I think it must be the Danville in California.)

About why limbs drop suddenly, the writer said:

Researchers are still learning about the syndrome, but they theorize that during periods of hot dry weather, trees suck more water into their branches. This causes the branches, which are already arid and brittle, to snap from the weight of the water...One woman reported hearing a loud crack and then seeing water spill out of a large branch.

That last sentence sounded rather strange, but I'll reserve judgment.

I've heard eucalypt branches snap and drop many times, in the bush - the thump of the timber hitting the ground is frightening but I've never been close enough to be alarmed.

I found a fascinating snippet in an article by Robert L Santos of California State University:

Drought in recent years has made Californians more conscience [sic] of water conservation especially in regard to plant life. Some eucalyptus species have proven to be drought resistant. In the 1917 [sic], there was a drought in California where temperatures hovered between 110 and 120 degrees F. It was found that the foliage on most eucalyptus trees burned with the amount of tree damage being dependent upon type of soil and wind. Trees in loamy soil did better than those on sandy soil because it contained more moisture. A survey was done concerning the number of trees killed by the 1917 drought. It was found that of 2,885 blue gum trees examined only 9 died. The red gum did even better in that only 10 trees died out of 4,461.

I'd say that's true of the Parklands. I think many of the dead trees are wattles.



Two hopeful points, then - the eucalypts are tough; and the wattles are good at reproducing. Penny had a good look at the babies around the dead tree and gave them the paws-up for survival potential.


















Anyway, back to our walk...
Many areas of grass were dusty and dead, with lines of cracks stitched across the ground.



We spent some pleasant time chasing balls but we took care to avoid the areas with the potentially leg-breaking cracks. (One of us chased balls; the other is too old and too tired out from the heat to raise a gallop, so she, having the advantage of arms and fingers, threw the balls.)
Then it was time for a cool off in the creek.






Here is another article with information on 'sudden limb drop':Summer Limb Drop on Ornamental Trees by Pam Geisel, farm advisor at the University of California.

a dog goes out in the mid-day sun

Penny has helped with the garden today and done some sun-baking. All very well, except for the fact that the temperature reached 44°C today. (That's 111°F.)

'Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the mid-day sun,' as the song says.
But I think Penny's not mad, she's just loyal. So every time I ventured out to see how the poor sad plants were coping, or looked around to check there was still water for the birds and insects, she came out too.

The plants had a terrible time and not all the insects made it through the day, either. Here's a lovely beetle that died in the heat.









But this praying mantis made it, because I found it trying to get a drink from the tap - no luck of course, because of water restrictions the tap was off - and brought it inside for the day to sit in a jar on a little wet sponge.







Penny was quite chirpy for most of the day but flaked out on the floor of the kitchen when the power went off (and our cooling went with it). Thank goodness it was only for an hour or so.

Tomorrow is predicted to be equally hot. So once again it will be a restful day for Penny, except for those little excursions to check the garden.