By: Hailey Colwell

In the University of Minnesota dairy barns on the St. Paul campus, it’s almost as hot inside as it is outside.

With 106 cows and a few calves to milk, feed and clean up after every day, assistant barn manager Nate McDonald said working in and around the barns — which are part of  the Midwest Dairy Foods Research Center — is heat and labor-intensive.

“You’ve got to suck it up and drink a lot of water,” he said.

McDonald is one of many University employees coping with rising temperatures as he works outside during the summer. Some areas of the University — including Facilities Management — offer heat safety training to employees, but no institution-wide protocol exists.

Doing physical work outside in high temperatures and humidity puts workers at risk of heat stress, heat exhaustion and heat stroke — a serious condition that occurs when the body can’t regulate its temperature.

McDonald and the barn manager make sure their employees get breaks from being out in the sun and drink plenty of liquids to stay safe on hot days, McDonald said. They also try to do the most intense labor — like shoveling — themselves.

McDonald, who works outside year-round, said he prefers winter because cows can get heat-stressed in summer.

“Cows do better in winter; we do better in winter,” he said.

University Landcare gardener Steve Chichester said though he’s worked outside for six years building irrigation systems, he’s never seen anyone get heat stroke.

To avoid heat-related injuries, Chichester said his team does more difficult jobs in the morning when it’s cooler.

Genetics and cell biology junior Joey Krenz drives a golf cart around campus for his summer Landcare job, which he said is a nice change from working in a lab during the school year.

Krenz said stays cool on the job by sprinkling water on himself as he waters flowers.

“It’s not as bad as you’d think,” he said.

To stay hydrated, Krenz said he fills a thermos with coffee and drinks it until his first break at 9 a.m., when he fills the thermos with water for the rest of the day. 

Working in the heat has been an “adjustment,” said architecture sophomore Nathan Tripp, who started working for Landcare at the beginning of the summer.

To avoid overheating, Tripp said he orders his daily tasks depending on the heat. He’ll do work requiring a heat-generating backpack blower during the cooler part of the day, for example, and save smaller jobs like pruning for the afternoon.

“It’s just a lot of common sense,” he said.

During the summer, Landcare supervisors hold weekly “toolbox talks” and in-depth safety meetings every other month to remind employees of the risks of being outside and how to avoid injury.

In addition to drinking lots of water, employees can stay hydrated by avoiding caffeine and large amounts of sugar, said Landcare supervisor Jason Grode.

Not drinking alcohol the night before work can also decrease the risk of heat illnesses, he said.

In the last eight years, Landcare has had no reports of heat-related injuries, Grode said.

Landcare work crews are given the option of starting an hour earlier on particularly hot days — which is healthy for employees and the landscape, he said. Laying turf, for example, is more effective when the ground is cool.

“It’s kind of a win-win situation when we can come in early,” he said.

Other risks of working outside

As a graduate student in the late 1970s, horticultural science professor Tom Michaels said he really enjoyed doing research outside.

“Back then, less was known [about skin cancer], and one of the great things about this field work was you could get a fantastic tan,” he said. “Now, I’m the guy with the big floppy hat.”

Working outside in the summer to plant beans for his research, Michaels said he worries more about the sun than the heat and reminds his research crew to wear long sleeves and put on sunscreen.

A constant reminder of the importance of staying safe in the sun is Bud Markhart, Michaels said, a University professor who died in 2012 from complications of melanoma.

Markhart always reminded faculty members to take care of themselves, Michaels said.

“Across the department, that had quite a big impact,” he said. “He certainly made us really aware of covering up.”

Although there is no uniform safety training for researchers like Michaels who spend long hours outside, he said he might look into it because having another reminder to take precautions can only help.

“Even though we practice common sense,” he said, “it’s easy to do dumb things.”