23/01/2025
It's ! 🌬️❄️🏠🌡️🐈 Is shiny silver Mylar bubble wrap good insulation for cat shelters? The answer is NO, but don't get rid of your foil wrap just yet!
We have to get a little nerdy to explain. "Insulation" is material that slows down heat loss through walls, floors, and roofs. Mylar bubble wrap provides hardly any insulation — 1-inch foam board is 5 times better, 2-inch foam board is 10 times better. But Mylar does something that most insulation doesn't do. It really "shines" as a "radiant barrier" — a shiny surface that reflects heat back toward its source when exposed to air. If you line the inside of your cat shelters with Mylar bubble wrap, it will reflect the cats' body heat back on them, complementing the insulation. So if you want to make your insulated cat shelters even warmer without adding bulk, add a radiant barrier!
Remember, a radiant barrier won't work unless it's exposed to air. So you only need to line the ceiling and upper walls of a cat shelter with it, since the straw bedding covers the floor and lower part of the walls. Also, while Mylar bubble wrap is cheap and easy to find, the shiny part is a very thin coating that may get dull and ineffective after a few years inside a busy cat shelter. For a more durable radiant barrier, choose foil tape or foil stick-on sheets made for human homes. For an all-in-one solution, use foam insulation board coated with reflective foil on one side, with the shiny side facing inward on the walls and ceiling.
To learn how to build 4 different DIY cat shelter designs, register for our FREE "Building Shelters for Outdoor Cats" webinar, coming up on Wednesday, January 29: https://bit.ly/BFCIBSR
