I do feed mine second cutting grass hay occasionally, but only in very small amounts. The 2nd cutting is much softer than the first, hardly any stems.
There have been SEVERAL folks on BYC that have had impacted crop issues that they've done surgery on, and removed balls of hay from the crop. Thus, my opinion is that hay is not the best thing to feed to chickens. I think the strands are so long that they can possibly get balled up in the crop.
That being said, as I indicated, I DO feed a bit of hay, but only 2nd cutting grass hay, and I really only do it about once a week in the winter to give them something to scratch at, since there is no grass in my run then.
Everyone has to do what they are comfortable with, but we all need to know what the consequences can be.
There have been SEVERAL folks on BYC that have had impacted crop issues that they've done surgery on, and removed balls of hay from the crop. Thus, my opinion is that hay is not the best thing to feed to chickens. I think the strands are so long that they can possibly get balled up in the crop.
That being said, as I indicated, I DO feed a bit of hay, but only 2nd cutting grass hay, and I really only do it about once a week in the winter to give them something to scratch at, since there is no grass in my run then.
Everyone has to do what they are comfortable with, but we all need to know what the consequences can be.
