Hay Poke and Eye Ulcer!

[Boarworld]

Does anyone have any suggestions (unlikely) how I can help stop my daft as a broom piggy (age 9m) from burrowing and using her face to rummage massively in the hay pile? Or alternately different hay that has bigger ‘pieces’?

My three girls have a huge pile of fresh hay every day, for food and for enrichment. I have been buying Pillow Wad Meadow Hay for ages, no issues but it does seem a bit finer recently.

Piggy was fine as far as I was aware until this afternoon. Eating and drinking normally, wheeking when the fridge opens, etc. My eldest got home from school (the pigs very caring ‘owner’ though of course I’m actually responsible for their care) and noticed she wasn’t herself and that she had a bit of a squinty eye. I had a close look and sure enough, she did. A bit squinty and when I gently looked under her eyelid it seemed swollen.

Managed to get her to the vet within the hour. She was examined (in good health generally and has gained weight since the last weigh in she’s 1075g at 9m). The vet had a look, could see ‘something’ not right, then put coloured drops in her eye to look under blue light and there it was. A huge ulcer in her eyeball. Poor little mite! She was so good being examined too, likely frozen due to fear response but still.

She had some numbing cream on her eye and a good sterile eyewash to try and flush anything foreign out - nothing. At which point I’m starting to get a bit concerned that something more serious was underlying.

Final attempt to see if there was a more innocent explanation and I had to look away, but the vet used tweezers to look under her extra eyelid and around the eyeball. There it was, a flipping piece of hay about 5mm long. Must’ve been there a while to cause an ulcer.

Anyhow, she’s had a big injection of metacam to cover the next 24h, then I will give it orally for the next 7 days. She also has antibiotic cream for her eye for me to put on 3x daily for the next week, then it’s back to the vets to check that it’s cleared, or at least is clearing, up.

So - given that I need to give them loads of fresh hay and I don’t use hay racks is there anything I can do except for switch the hay? Unless anyone has any suggestions to train her into not going in like a loon with her eyes wide open then it seems a different sort of hay is the only option!

Also the vet said on examination that her teeth are a little bit long. Not to the point that she needs them trimming (yet) but she said if she’s eating loads of hay which she is then they should be wearing down a bit more. So I’m wondering if she needs something more robust.

£138 later and she’ll be fine, but don’t want her or the others to hurt themselves again. Will also be taking the other two to the vet later this week for a tooth check and general once over.

She seems to have recovered from her rather grim ordeal and is currently enjoying her position of spoiled Queen, in the special bed my eldest has made for her (made of her cuddle cup, with a hidey on top) munching on dandelion leaves!

 

[Edam]

Sorry to hear this has happened, but sounds as though you are a very caring owner for the little girlie so she is lucky to be with you.

I will wait for the experienced individuals to come along for some more robust advice, but in terms of hay I use Natures Own Pets Hay and it is lovely and soft for the piggies (and very affordable too, I ran the numbers on a lot of the big hay brands online and it is the cheapest by kg). It gets delivered super quick and the pigs love it. I also use a fabric hay bag alongside their hay piles, I'm not sure if that would help (though as I write this I am looking at my GP now and his whole head is in the hay bag so not sure how protective it would be....!)

 

[Boarworld]

Thank you I’ll have a look at that brand. I mean she literally dives in head first as soon as I put the fresh hay down, burrows in it and then popcorns around in it. She’s bonkers! Often I’ll be standing in the kitchen the other side of the house from their home and all I can see is little bundles of hay bouncing up and down.

I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself dear, but perhaps close your eyes first?!

Maybe I need to get her some piggy goggles made.

 

[Lorcan]

Tbh you can never completely negate the haypoke danger. Bann was a menace for it, but only after I'd already had him for a couple of years and he refused point blank to eat soft hay. He was a skinny, I don't know why he just ignored soft hay, but it was apparently only edible when it was stabby.

The Quartet still get the same hay because I know they'll eat it. Despite Mourne's inability to stay out of the centre of a pile of hay, and he plows himself in and covers himself in it and so on, I've not had another eye injury, and it's really not soft hay. I've wondered about changing it but they eat the current stuff with gusto, so so I just keep an eye on his eyes. Just in case.

 

[Wiebke]

Unfortunately, there is simply no guaranteed soft hay but burrowing and playing in the hay is one of the most essential enrichment activities for piggies since it triggers natural instincts and behaviours from using dense undergrowth to den in and to create their little individual nooks and crannies to sleep in a little tunnel of dry grass.

I do also use Nature's Own Hay because it is the best compromise between quality and cost for my own lot and fared a lot better than other hay brands when I trialled for a new hay supplier. We order in bulk, enough each time for a free delivery.

Anyway, I feed meadow hay and have that in my hay trays for romping and sleeping in, which is generally quite a bit softer than timothy, with their sweet meadow hay as a treat. The latter often even softer but also more fattening when fed in bulk.
However, I still have the occasional hay poke and see capsules or stalks stuck under a lid. Some piggies seem to be more prone to the latter than others; one of mine somehow managed to make a whole brass blade disappear under a lid, where it then cut into the cornea. Not once, not even twice but four times! You just can't exclude them completely. Especially when you also get piggies who launch themselve straight into an oncoming load of hay...

I would recommend to have some plain carbomer based human eye gel at home at all times. It doesn't prevent a vet trip but it can help with slowing down a developing infection until you can see a vet, washing out infection gunk, soothing the eye and create an ideal healing environment deeper inside the eye with a hay poke and speeding up the healing process by up to several days.
First Aid: Immediate Care Measures and Non-medication Products

 

[Boarworld]

Thanks Weibke, yes that’s exactly what all three of them do. They make tunnels and dens…it’s like a little rabbit warren down the hay end of the cage! If I can’t find this one in the hideys, you can guarantee she’s snoozing buried somewhere and doesn’t emerge until she hears the fridge door or a rustling bag! Either that or she waits until it’s almost time for the daily change and it’s getting a bit mucky and flops down on top of it, like a little piggy pancake.

Sigh. I thought this may be the case. I’ve never had an eye injury or a hay poke before I was hoping there was something I could change to avoid them. I will take a look at the different hays. I want to ensure their teeth are all staying healthy/wearing down as they ought to as well. Her bottom teeth looked really quite long to me today but the vet didn’t seem overly concerned, just mentioned it as something to watch.