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Hay

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devonbelle

devonbelle

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I know this should probably come under the food section but I'd like as wide a variety of opinions as possible sop thought I'd post here.

I buy the usual bog-standard hay for my piggies, with the chamomile and forage varieties from P@H but see so many talked about on here that I would like your recommendations as to the best hays for piggies.

Thanks
 
I am of the opinion of if the piggies like it it is good! watch joanne and lisa go on and on and on about hay! lol he he
 
Lovely you will soon enter into the hay club :))!

I wuv the orchard grass Oxbow hay, Timothy hay is good but a bit stalky.

I know the hay you use, :xthat was the first hay my piggies ever got it's made by the woodland range, I use to alternate between the forage and the chamoile one. £2.99 for such a small bag though is it about 500grams?

Major hit with my piggies is the bunny grass dried hay, I give them a different hay aswell as there usual hay. They have 1 hay rack with oxbow timothy and one with orchard grass(my absolutely favourite) sometimes I wonder if I could eat it :))!

I placed a new hay order tonight I got the burns oat hay which is very green, and burns chamoile hay. I also have a cheap hay for piggies to sleep on and pee on but the good hays are kept off the ground, it is far to prices to allow.

Oxbow botantic smells lush but only comes in small bags and is quite pricey.

This is a very good offer, you help rescue and get 7 sample packs to try which includes all the oxbow hays and some burns for £7, can't really complain. Once you see the Oxbow you will see the difference in quality it is so very green but I in noway limit myself too just Oxbow, I like too have my 2main hays and then additional ones on top along with Lisa, we both have major hay problems :)).
BElow is the link.
http://www.animalmagicpetsupplies.c...th=/Shops/BT3336/Categories/Easter_Fundraiser

If you decide to go with Oxbow and have storage I would recommend buying in bulk, but I can't as no were to put it. I have to buy 4kg bags unfortunately animal magic doesn't do them, well I haven't seen :(.

I get my Oxbow 4kg bags from Hyperdrug uk, it is the cheapest I have found for 4kg, but I do believe animal magic have a very good price for the huge box can't remember how much is in it. I don't look into it much as I know parents would kill me and it's just not worth my life rolleyes.

Hope this helps :).
 
Just to add I have no clue why ":x" is in my first post, I quite liked the P @ H Woodlands range until I entered into the hay club, and discovered how many hays there were but I didn't find P @ H hay to be very green were as Oxbow is very green!
 
I knew it would not be long until you waxed lyrical about hay joanne :))

Don't get me wrong there is good hay and bad hay.... and we only like nice sweet smelling hay in this house!
 
I will confess to doing the same as Joanne. I buy big bales of meadow hay to line the hay trays, then I top with dried grass (very cheap), timothy hay (grown in Lancashire and bought by the bale after it was advertised on preloved and another more expensive hay (I have three trays).

For the more expensive hays I have so far tried Burns Oat Hay (very green and reasonably price at about £4 for 900g), Excel Herbage (about £4 for 1kg and loved by my furries this evening and Dust Free Timothy Hay (£5 per kg from Animal Magic, link above in Joanne's post).

In the past I have just fed meadow hay and dried grass, but my two eldest girls are now over 5 and my bunnies are between 5 and 6 and I decided that decent hay was a worthwhile investment. It sounds silly, but expensive hay is nothing compared to vet visits and neither of my two 5-year old girls have been to the vets with a problem of their own since I adopted them nearly four years ago.

I have also bought a lot of the sample bags from Animal Magic. They are a really good way to find out what your piggies like and I am saving mine to add from time to time to give variety.


Pollie.
 
Timothy hay and Orchard grass are sold in different types of "cuts" 1st cut, 2nd cut and 3rd cut. The type of cut refers to the time of the year in which the hay was harvested by the farmer. The time the crop is harvested will influence the texture the hay has.

If you are going to bulk buy timothy hay or orchard grass, it's always a good idea to ask the supplier what cut they will give you as each cut ranges from stalky hay with seed heads (good for wearing down teeth), stalky hay with leafy hay (mid range) with a few seed heads to soft leafy hay with very few seed heads. If you or your pigs have a strong preference for one type of hay, you may have to pay more attention to when you buy your hay and it's a good idea to bulk buy the hay at the appropriate time of the year to lower the risk of getting an unfavourable cut.

Often the mid (2nd) way hay between the two is preferred as the stalky hay is just that - stalky and quite rough - and the softer hay is as described - very flexible and grass-like. All cuts are green and of good quality, though, but guinea pigs do seem to have a preference for the softer cuts.

If you bought a bag of timothy hay or orchard grass and it was extremely or mildly stalky and had a few seed heads, it's a reflection of which cut that hay is from depending on when the farmer farmed the hay.
 
Maybe this would be the right place for a hay question I've been wanting to ask: Does hay get old? I recently bought 35 lbs of wonderful timothy hay and it smells great, how long is going to be 'fresh'?
 
Keep your hay dry and don't put it in airtight containers (it sweats) and it will last ages!

My 2 staple hays are Oxbow Timothy (my favourite) and Oxbow Orchard Grass (my piggies favourite). I like how stalky the Oxbow timothy hay is as it's so good for their teeth. I have used the Burns green oats hay and my lot absolutely adored it. It's a treat hay in this house now. Not a staple.

I have cheaper hay for the hay boxes, currently from dust free hay co as I kept finding thorns and thistles in other brands.

If I were you I'd just try a few kinds. Careful as once you feed mainly green hay it's quite hard to go back to hay that isnt green.

A fab one to try for you would the the alfalfa kinf timothy hay which is sold in pets at home. It's green and pigs tend to love it. Good quality hay.

Welcome to the wonderful world of hay exploration :(|)
 
Well I just bought a bag of Excel Birchbark and Timothy and my piggies are extra picky but have gone bonkers for it, they popcorn and wheek as soon as the bag comes out, and at £1.87 I thought it was cheap in comparison the to Excel dandelion one, which they don't bother much with so we waste a lot of it. It is a smaller bag, but compressed well and has fed 10 piggies as a treat once a day for about a week so really hope my feed supplier can start getting bigger bags of it.

For bedding hay I buy Yorkshire Hay, or use my dad's own (farmers daughter) but find my dad's is really dusty and sets me off sneezing and itching, hence I try to buy dustless whenever I'm doing my piggy shopping.
 
JoanneG111 said:
If you decide to go with Oxbow and have storage I would recommend buying in bulk, but I can't as no were to put it. I have to buy 4kg bags unfortunately animal magic doesn't do them, well I haven't seen :(.
Click to expand...

Hi Joanne, we do do them , I just haven't got round to listing it on the website, will sort it asap :)
 
I just wanted to thank you all for your advice. I never knew that there is SOOOOOOOO much to know about hay!:{

I will be trying out all your suggestions and have started with an order for a selection pack, as advised. I'm sure Bill and Ben will be thrilled. I'm now so excited I can't wait for it to arrive.

I will post again when I have had a proper piggy assessment with photos if I can.

Many thanks again!
 
Funny how excited we get about them eating hay isn't it? :(|)
 
JoanneG111 said:
They have 1 hay rack with oxbow timothy and one with orchard grass(my absolutely favourite) sometimes I wonder if I could eat it :))!
Click to expand...

What exactly is the 'orchard grass'? I assumed (perhaps wrongly) that it was the same as Readigrass? I've just done a Hay Experts order and have tried a few new varieties but I didn't order any Orchard Grass as I already have Readigrass. Would be interesting to know if this is actually long stem hay.
 
Orchard grass, is a grass hay if you like... it is alot softer than timothy and very green! Less messy too, my pigs love it :).
 
We only give ours Oxbow timothy now, as in the past we have had too many Mite and fungal outbreaks that were all traced back to the hay.

Oxbow is imported from the states so has to be heat treated before it comes in, thus no mites or fungal spors. (DEFRA Rules)

More than a bit pricey though at £65 for a 25lb bag.

Paul & Jeanette
 
Paul-H said:
We only give ours Oxbow timothy now, as in the past we have had too many Mite and fungal outbreaks that were all traced back to the hay.

Oxbow is imported from the states so has to be heat treated before it comes in, thus no mites or fungal spors. (DEFRA Rules)

More than a bit pricey though at £65 for a 25lb bag.

Paul & Jeanette
Click to expand...

Oh I don't know - I just paid £80 for 20 small bales from Dust Free Hay :{.
 
JoanneG111 said:
Orchard grass, is a grass hay if you like... it is alot softer than timothy and very green! Less messy too, my pigs love it :).
Click to expand...

Orchard grass isn't always soft, but it is a grass hay. The softness of the hay depends on what cut the hay is - you're lucky if you've only ever gotten soft orchard grass, it isn't always like that depending on when you buy and the supplier.
 
I think Paul meant that it costs £65 for 50lb (22.7kg) of Oxbow hay. It costs £40 for 25lb. :)

The ten-bale deal for Dust Free Hay weighs around 25kg and costs £40.

Dust Free is slightly cheaper, but not a patch on Oxbow quality.
 
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