Piggies first outing in run in the garden

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morgan

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I have got the 6ft run which just needs to be assembled and hoping if the weather is suitable on Thursday to let the girls have a run in it.
I know it used to be suggested to not to let them eat too much grass as first due to the risk of bloat.
Is that still the recommendation and if so how long should they be in the run for a first outing?
 
It’s could still be a little early to be considering time in the grass. Air temperature may be warming up but the ground is likely still very cold. The guide for when they can go out is (in addition to the temperature being high enough) is that you need to be able to stand on the grass with bare feet without your feet feeling at all cold or damp.

Literally five minutes on the grass for the first time. If there is then any gap in time (ie weather gets cold again and they can’t go out again for a while) then you have to start again with that five minutes.
So I would do five minutes every day for a week (obviously weather needs to be warm enough for it to be able to happen). 10 minutes a day for the next week. 15 mins the next week and so on.

For my boys, I start handpicking grass in February/march and feeding it to them in their cage to start getting their gut ready for grass - this is long before they get out on the grass for the first time. They then get 10-15 minutes on the grass from around April. I then increase in 30 mins increments for a couple of weeks etc until they are out all day from around mid summer.
 
I will cut them some grass so they get used to it before they go out in earnest. Yes it may still be a little chilly on the ground and they are indoors at present
It is quite a knack getting them out of the cage so hopefully getting them back out of the run won't be too tricky as well!
 
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