Q for experienced piggy owners: Hay Solution?

Wheeksers

Wheeksers

Junior Guinea Pig
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Hayyy!

I am curious to those who have been long-term guinea pig owners: What was your hay solution when you first started being a piggy parent versus today? Why the change? (bonus points for those with pics haha).

:)

For me, I started with a hay ball that hung from the top of the cage. That only lasted for about a week before I realized they were not eating enough hay. I've migrated through different possible solutions - landing on this one as my current - a hanging, swinging, bent grid that helps prevent piggies from getting in and peeing on the hay while allowing access. That was until I bought the wrong cut of hay and now they just have a big-o-pile to play in

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I use to do that untill my pigs feet will get red the vet told me that why he walked in his pee and poop he said just put little bite at a times if it get low add more
 
In the winter, my piggies have hay in a big pile on the floor of the hutch to help keep them warm as they can burrow underneath it. In the summer they have old wine boxes (the kind with 6 bottles in) in the hutch. In the run in the winter they have a big pile of hay in the middle and in the summer they have ferret litter trays with hay in.
 
The boys used to have hay in a bag. They started climbing inside so I moved to hay in a tray. They loved that so that’s what I used going forward. Now they’re outside they have a hutch stuffed with hay. The girls started with a pile of hay in their temporary housing then had a hay tray.
 
For starters when I first owned guinea pigs (which was only about 5-6 months ago, although it feels like I've owned them for a lifetime) I used to think they never used to eat hay and I wasn't particularly bothered by this at the time as I was inexperienced and luckily as it was the summer they would get huge bags of grass everyday.

I used to get fairly cheap hay and would be quite stingy with the hay I would buy, always the cheapest as I thought it was all the same.. (although I would spend alot of money on new cages, toys and vegetables all the time)

I remember my boyfriend commenting on how green the hay is in America when watching YouTube channels and it made me question why I would scrimp on hay which is over 80% of their diet but not hold back on buying fairly expensive toys, hidies, vegetables and just general stuff they didn't need all the time haha.

Then I discovered green hay from haybox that I didn't think was possible. I'd never seen green hay before and know I feel guilty for not discovering it sooner. It's definitely worth the investment.

Then I went through the stage of trying to keep the hay off the fleece as much as possible as the fleece was new and trying to get them to use hay racks. Now I literally throw large handfuls in all the time and they love it. I just try not to think about the mess. No one's going to see all the hay anyway! And now it's all over my House 🏠 😂
This is their current cage covered in Hay. Sod the fleece. MVIMG_20210121_201749.webp
 
Mine had 32 litre underbed storage boxes filled with newspaper and hay. I now give them shallow shoe trays (from argos) lined with newspaper and hay and a wooden magazine rack full of hay.

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This is such lovely responses! I decided to DOLL up the hay area and use the doll bed from Ikea


I know my biggest issue with doing the pile of hay is removing the wet hay daily - I feel like I end up taking out all of the hay - but that's prob cause I have 6 piggies :D


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I am a neat freak so no hay solution ever suits me lol.

I tend to mix it up to keep things interesting for my boys. Sometimes it's a large hay tray, sometimes it's a bath mat with a hay pile. I'll use a rack too sometimes to make sure there's always some dry hay around.

I also move the hay location to opposite ends of the cage. They go nuts on cleaning day doing zoomies and popcorning so I don't think they mind the move around!

I have small trays in their play pen - that doesn't really change though. I like these particular trays but they're a bit too small for everyday use I think, perfect for the play pen though.

Here's today's ensemble...no piggies though, they were being camera shy...
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@CV26 I'm a neat freak too! I feel like having these piggies is helping work through that compulsion to always clean up their hay area! Right now, I just want to make it all neat and tidy but I know that it's only benefiting me - not them - so you know - they are now my therapy guineas. Hah!

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😁 One of my piggies usually does most of his poops in the hay tray so when that's in use his cage is a doddle. But the other one just poops mountains everywhere so I always feel the need to keep his cage tidy. I've been known to be on a work call (not Zoom) and casually doing a quick cage tidy at the same time.
 
Every piggy of mine does something different but essentially they all like to eat off the floor. Louise's long hair was causing mayhem in the girl's side as she galloped about like a runaway bride dragging hay and bedding (and poops) everywhere so she's had a lockdown haircut (see before and after below) and is much happier: a popcorning pompom!
Louise side view.webp Louise's home haircut.webp Louise's big face.webp
You can see her in the corner she favours for eating/sleeping/toileting (she has no standards!) - hay manger and hay pile below - she's just sleeping off a pile of grass from this morning. Zara never sleeps in the hay but she does like to lie on a bit of fleece next to it. This hay is the 'woodlands' timothy type from PaH which is going down a storm at the minute. I pile up the hay and grass on both sides of the bars so the neighbours eat together. There is a little cut-up bit of towel on each side which gets the worst of the action - it can be picked out like a little bag of an evening before sweep-up time. The pigs also have bedding hay to burrow in the 'cage' bit and a hay-ball/hay 'cardboard tube' which they ignore for a few days then suddenly strip. They are in the kitchen so I add a bit to the pile a couple of times a day but never a lot. I tried that tip for hopeful wheekers of a handful of hay instead of thru the day veggies and it's working well. I make sure the manger/ball/tube always has something in so I can feel content that they're not going to just have peed-on hay... although they still seem to eat it. I reckon George does it on purpose to claim his, as he 'seasons' his hay pile as soon as it arrives! Maybe he's just got great tasting pee or maybe he likes it moist, who knows?

Waste disposal is a real limiting factor in our location so it's more that than the cost I have to think about. We have no garden waste, no outside bin and sacks outside quickly attract vermin so all our waste/recycling has to be kept in the house... with fortnightly collections you can see we have to be careful with quantity!
 
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