Bird feather in hay

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Mandy

Well-known member
Joined
Dec 11, 2010
Messages
352
Hi,
I use Oxbow hays (Orchard, timothy, alfalfa, and herbal).

I went to feed today and found a bird feather in the pile of orchard grass.
Should I be concerned with finding this?

I don't own a bird, nor do I know anything about them. I don't know if anything could be spread to the hay that would cause me to have to toss the orchard.

I haven't sifted through the rest of the hay to see if theres any more, just thought I'd ask as it's feeding time and the chinnies are jumpin' for their hay!

Thanks
 
i personally wouldn't worry about a single bird feather in the hay. hay grows outside, birds roost in it, they drop their feathers now and then, and the person baling and packing the hay may have missed it.
 
Hey,
I was just worried I would find the rest of the bird..
 
Eww.. You guys are going to make me start digging through hay for bird DNA from now on.
Lol, protien.. Thats what my dad use to say at bbqs with those pesky flies. :p
 
I've found a feather or two in my hay. One time I noticed Chloe was eating something and she was making weird faces while pawing her mouth. I freaked and thought she had dental problems until I looked closer and saw she was trying to eat a feather, hehe!
 
Oh wow, Haha. By the looks of your icon she was probably doing it with the cutest, most innocent look too.
They'll try to eat anything, eh?
Don't think I could get the ew factor at them eating a feather when they eat their poops.
There was a video on YouTube of someone feeding their chinchilla a moth/butterfly. I think id pass out if I saw them sticking anything like that in their mouth, though.
 
My horse loved the crunchy surprises that came in bales. Yuck.

My most recent batch of timothy has a bunch of petrified horse poo in it. Ironic I think...

There isn't much I haven't seen in bales, no human body parts yet but plenty of clothing items, <ahem> personal protection, crispy critters, pretty much anything that blows or falls into the field. :p
 
Oh my, Spoof!
It's easy to forget where these things actually come from when we get them at stores in pretty packaging.

I have to say, though, it shall be a fun adventure every-time I get hay.
An occasional grab bag!
 
the worst i've come across so far is what looked like thistles in one mini bale i bought a while ago that wasn't oxbow.
 
I found thistle like things all through my 9lb Oxbow timmy once. Not just a little piece but tons of it. Took a pic and emailed it to them. They said it was Tumbleweed and sent me a new 9lb box of hay.

I haven't found much else! If it was a 15oz or 40oz Oxbow bag, they are done by hand and not supposed to have anything in them. They told me that when I sent in the pics of the 9lb tumbleweed hay.
 
We used to cut and bale our own alfalfa on the farm growing up, and remember checking the irrigation pipes for snakes and mice, so know that we probably baled a few of those in our hay! lol
 
Oh god this topic freaks me out every time. In the current bale I have, there are a lot of random little weeds, leaves, and flowers so when I find them I just throw them out and hope the rest of the hay is okay. Recently though I found burrs in several of my chins fur....that was fun to get out of their fur! Anyway the thought of finding a dead mouse of snake really freaks me out each time I stick my hand in to get another handful :-/
 
One of the last bales we baled and put into the barn had a snake
On the outside of a bale.

Sometimes I think we forget hay is grass and harvested from a field... Anything and everything can be found in it lol
 
Well, the other day my chins found part of a dead mouse in my 9lb oxbow timothy hay! Decapitated, mangled (had hay bits in it), smelled like pee but dry. I didn't see it when I gave it to them, but they dragged it out of the pile. Hope my chins did not take a bite of it.

Thoroughly grossed out.....
 
Just a dried grass hopper in my Oxbow once. Chins threw it to the side. Perhaps it should of been chocolate covered. Snorts.........
 
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