Could BUGS be found in Grass hay bale from the farm?

[Ellie&Alexa]

Hi, I have a question. I was wondering if bugs can be in hay bales from a farm. I am storing it in a plastic huge bin and drilled holes in all sides to let it breathe. I don’t want bugs in my house I am storing it in the closet in their room. should I store it in my garage? could get cold. I am hoping no bugs are in it.

[drwil]

Yes, there can be all kinds of things in baled hay.

If it has been stored for a while whatever bug is/was in it has probably died by now anyway. Wikipedia has a short write-up about storing hay safely for horses.

The main thing is not to allow it to become wet and moldy.

[Ellie&Alexa]

I just don’t want bugs in my house . I don’t want them to eat dead bugs. And I wonder if I’m allowed to store the hay in my garage. it isn’t really too cold in their because it  is a attatched garage.

[LittlePuffyTail]

I don’t think there are any bugs that actually live in hay bales. At least, I’ve never seen any in my 20+ years of being a horse girl.

I don’t think you can avoid the odd dead bug in hay. I buy Oxbow hay which is one of the best and I find a dead grasshopper once in a while. My bunnies don’t eat them. Although, Olivia brought one in her bed once.

[LBJ10]

Bugs are outside. Hay is grown outside. Of course, bugs will flee when they feel the hay being picked up and transported. Others will fall out. The odd bug might make it into the package, but they will die before too long. I have never found a live bug in any of the hay I have purchased. Buns typically don’t eat bugs, but accidental ingestion of one shouldn’t cause harm.

What bugs are you worried about? The bugs typically found in hay are not ones that will infest your house.

[Ellie&Alexa]

Ok thank you

[Azerane]

Yes of course there can be bugs in hay. I buy farm bales (as opposed to shop packaged hay which seems to often be cleaner) and I’ve only had an issue once where the bale had a bit of an earwig problem. Fortunately I was bagging up the bale straight after I bought it and so was essentially sifting through and all the earwigs ended up down the bottom of the bale so I just threw away the earwigs left at the bottom with the few scraps of hay.

I store my hay outside, but I’ve never noticed having bugs inside from the hay I bring in. If concerns about inside storage are worrying you, you can get round vent covers for the holes that you’ve made in the tub, they usually have a fine mesh on them to stop bugs. You could also attach patches of fly screen mesh over the holes and seal with tape around the edges to still allow it to breath by prevent any possible bugs crawling out.

[Love4Bunny]

I found a flattened vole in my last batch of hay, so yeah, you can find anything in there

[Author]

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