Hay - Quality

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flm1977

How do you know if hay is good quality or not?

So far I've tried:

hay from acorn petstore with foreign writing on it..could be German not sure, mixed with dandelion and the other one was mixed with something else. But John wouldn't eat it. And it was the first time I had ever bought hay.

Then went and bought P@H timothy hay. Which both boys have eaten no problems. It's always been brown, very bitty once you get to the bottom of the bag and I think dusty (certainly dust seems to fly the further down the bag you go) have had to like rip it out the bag in handfuls, sometimes really pull to get it out.

Yesterday bought Wagg meadow hay. Never used it before but was in Asda anyways and needed hay so thought why not.
It doesn't look as thick as P@H timothy (hope that makes sense), but has green in it rather than all brown (is this good?) and seems more seperated out than the timothy hay. Came easily out the bag.
Boys are devouring it as I type so it must taste good :)

But how do you tell what si good hay and what isn't so good? colour? smell? size/thickness? etc etc
 
green hay is normally the best i think, like oxbow is lovely sweet smelling and green although its too expensive for me to buy so mine just get meadow hay and i treat them to timothy hay when i can afford..but if its grown over here it does tend to be brown from what ive seen.
 
i try avoid the asda hay, although its green i found it really coarse, and the boys didnt like it. i could have got a dud batch though.

also when i used it the boys caught mites :/ not sure if it was from the hay, as soeone told me when i got the pigs that some hay can cause mites, though I'm not sure if its true. to be on the safe side i never used that hay again.

the timothy hay ive had from P@H hasnt been too bad, but their meadow hay is very dusty.

wilcos hay is ok for bedding, it comes in nice long strands.

ive currently switched hay again. i found a small petshop on my local market that sells hay bagged up, and its only 85p a bag, i think its fresh from farm shops with it being on a market. its very green and th boys have ditched the timothy hay to eat it.

maybe you could try looking round other petshops and see if they do fresh hay like this?
 
Green & sweet smelling is the hay my piggies like, tho' i have had a bale of "golden" coloured hay & they loved it
 
i use pets at home hay and my little piggies seem to like it it doesn't take long for it to disappear

its also dust free :)
 
Farm hay is the best, anything from stores like p@h, asda, tesco etc I wouldnt shake a pooey shoe at O0
 
Living in Somerset, I can get my hands on free hay but I to am unsure, as it does not have lables on, so I have been using Timothy hay which I do pay for.
 
I let my Goats judge any hay I have ::)
if the goats eat it its good if they dont the piggys dont get it.
belive it or not but Goats are the fussiest animals to feed.People say they will eat anything but belive me they dont they wont even eat out of a bucket that one of the others have ate from
 
Goats, we had one as a kid and my sister left her new school coat on the grass... the goat had chewed holes in it. We used to camp out the garden (as kids) and were having a cook up one night, and the goat stole the packet of lard and eat it.
 
I have the fussiest binnies (thats what my daughter call ours 2 girls). At the start they were only feed P@H timothy hay because i didn't know any better, I then tried oxbow timothy which they went through so quickly however living in the Scottish highlands it was costing me £20 a kg. Too expensive for me unfortunately.

and every other hay I could buy locally but no joy. Just received two bales from "Dust Free Hay" one timothy and one meadow. they love the timothy and won't stop munching at it. At £11 delivered for timothy and £8 for meadow I will be ordering from their again.
 
my piggies have started turning their nose up at timothy hay, and only eat the 85p hay i buy from the market now! ;D

it is very nice green hay but as its in unmarked bags i dont think its timothy hay :-\
 
My other problem is storage, we live in a 2 bedroom flat, the cat has the conservatory room, where his littler tray and his mega large cat scratch, where he lays on the top looking out the window to survey his domain.
I do not think it would be health to put a bale of hay in there because of the litter tray. So I am buying the small bags.
 
Thanks for the link, I will try it, many many thanks, think I will have to store it under my diningroom table.
 
I store my hay bales in a single quilt cover, keeps the mess in one place & allows it to breathe :)
 
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