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[ahappycamper]

I know that it's best to feed chincillas certain pellet brands, like the Mazuri, Tradition, Oxbow, etc. but what about hay? Do certain brands have more nutritious hay than others? Today I went to Walmart and saw they were selling KAYTEE TIMOTHY HAY. I know the KAYTEE PELLET isn't too good because they mix some other tsuff in it, but is the Timothy Hay good?

[Jo Ann]

   The hay is the good side of them ...    ... It's kinda hard to mess up hay, but I have found a few that could do it ... Kaytee does not seem to be one of them.   I've always found the Kaytee hay to be clean, crisp and bug free. 

I like to use a mix of 1/2 and 1/2 Timothy and Alfalfa hay, especially for the young ones.  When I have a pregnant mom or nursing mom, she gets all alfalfa.  Breeders' choice and availability plays allot into it.

Any hay, regardless of the brand, should not have mold or mildew and should not smell sour or musty.  When in doubt, throw it out!   

   Jo Ann

[Ladykelia]

Actually, I'm going to disagree about Kaytee brand of hay, because of a recent event:

A couple of weeks ago I held my chin, despite the fact that he hates it, and I started panicking because hives broke out all down my arm where I had been holding him. I thought I had developed an allergy to him! I haven't had him that long, about 4-5 months, but this had never happened before when I've held him. Then i remembered i had gotten extremely ill the last time I had cleaned his cage. So I got logical and realized that allergies don't just suddenly happen so I figured it was something chinchilla related and probably something that had changed recently.

The likely culprits? The chinchilla dust or the timothy hay. After a few tests I determined that it was indeed the hay, and I broke out into hives and rashes consistently after touching it. "Well that's weird" I thought. I didn't have any problems for the first few months we had Hermes. Then after talking to my husband we remembered that the new bag of hay we had recently bought was not the same brand that we had before. We had been using Oxbow's western timothy grass, but had gone to Petco and bought Kaytee because of the couple brands they had, it looked the most fresh and crisp and green (probably because of the pesticides and chemicals used on it  ).

Since that epiphany, I went back and bought the Petco brand of hay. It doesn't look as nice and is a bit dusty, but I stuck my arm in, swished it around a bit, stuck some in Hermes' hay box, let it sit on my hand for awhile before washing, and nothing happened. I didn't even sneeze.

I had a guinea pig before, and I would get sick after holding him or cleaning his cage. I had figured I was allergic to Yuki himself, and that the hay was only a mild irritant.. But seeing as we were using Kaytee back then (although I never got rashes from it..), I'm starting to rethink this.

My conclusion is that I am never using Kaytee hay again.. or really any of their small animal products probably. I have just found that generally they sell more low quality, overpriced and sometimes outright unhealthy products than many of their competitors. If it makes me break out in hives, how can I trust it to be healthy for my chin?

After I finish this bag of Petco brand, I'm going to stick with Oxbow pellets and hay unless a chinchilla expert tells me otherwise.

[Jo Ann]

    Now you have me wondering ... I'm going to have to do some "testing" of my own.  Most of the time, everything is fine ... but, on rare occasions ... I would get a mild rash just after taking care of the chins.   Something to think about.  It might depend on which crop/farmer or part of the country it came from originally.  I'll have to keep notes all year and see if it is a particular time of the year that this happens.

Has anyone else had this problem with any of the hay they feed their chins?  If so, what brand and type of hay was it?

   Jo Ann

[LindyLu]

Dewey doesn't eat hay. Weird, I know. I've offered Timothy, Alfalfa, and Oat Hay.... I've offered KayTee brand and Oxbow brand... I've offered it in a hay ball, in a hay box, in his food dish, and just in a pile on the cage floor... he won't eat it! He nibbles the alfalfa hay a little bit, but won't EAT hay. I can occasionally get him to eat Timothy pellets ... but mostly he just likes his Mazuri pellets.
Sorry...that's a little OT.

[Hoppinchins]

I don't know much about the other brands. I need my chins the western oxbow hay. They like it alot and I know its a great brand for them.

[eddiing]

I've made the switch from Oxbox hay to Alfalfa King's Timothy Hay because I feel like Alfalfa King's hay is so much better in quality. I am not saying that Oxbox hay quality (nutrition wise) is inferior when compared to Alfalfa King's but however, i do feel that there is some problem to Oxbox's quality control as of late. For example, I've found that inside A.King's there are much less "dust" at the bottom of the bag and it comes in mini bale bags (4 lbs) which makes it easier for me to "serve" the hay and i make less mess when handling the hay (that's not the big issue, but please read on )...

 About a month ago (before i made the switch), while i was about to get more hay from the oxbow bag (about half way done with the bag), I noticed something different, something that didn't appear like hay, so i dug in the bag with my hand and i found a "huge" feather inside the bag.. needless to say I was pretty puzzled on how something like the would happen to a name company such as oxbow. this might be a "freak accident" and i might be the only one that this have happened to, but needless to say, i was pretty upset by this incident. That was why i decided to give the new brand a try, and my chins seems to be more in love with Alfalfa king's hay than oxbows.

HOWEVER, if i ever somehow ran out of A. King's hay and i can't get more of it for some reason, i would go with Oxbow with no questions asked.

extra question about timothy hay..
does your chinchilla enjoy the flowerhead part of the timothy hay?

[Jo Ann]

About a month ago (before i made the switch), while i was about to get more hay from the oxbow bag (about half way done with the bag), I noticed something different, something that didn't appear like hay, so i dug in the bag with my hand and i found a "huge" feather inside the bag.. needless to say I was pretty puzzled on how something like the would happen to a name company such as oxbow. this might be a "freak accident" and i might be the only one that this have happened to, but needless to say, i was pretty upset by this incident.

    Did you notify the company?  Did you take a picture of it while still entangled in the hay?  If not, you should have done so and reported it to the company.  Companies are very sticky when it comes to their reputation, and Oxbow has one of the best reputations.  If not veterinarians would not carry in in their office.

I found a 'clump' of something that looked like something that might have been left in the tub after processing chinchilla pellets.  I took a picture of it still in the bag and sent it to this particular company with the date and code on the package ... they apologized and replaced the one bag with two and shipped them overnight to me.   Accidents do happen. BTW it was not Oxbow Chinchilla Pellets, but another very popular brand.

   Jo Ann

[jmdebb]

i used to always use oxbow's hays.. i liked oxbow very much and loved the varieties and my chins loved it too.. then last year it was so bad --so much brown hay i stopped using it.  now i have some i ordered online, but i just ordered some alfafa king hay for my website and it smells great, its all green... chins seem to like it, i also have some zupreme which seems kind of hard to me, but i just learned that with the different cuts the hardness is different.  i also decided to give oxbow a chance again and ordered like three bags, and opened one..[ordered for teh store..lol] and it's gotten better.