Can guinea pigs eat brambles and hawthorn?

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Ant and Dec

Ant and Dec

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My garden (junk yard) is absolutely OVERFLOWING with brambles and hawthorn.

Can I collect it, dry it and feed it to the guinea pigs?

I've googled and both bramble and hawthorn seem to be ok, but I just wanted to check :)
 
I have fed bramble leaves before but they do not seem to like the leaves onnce they get to full size. They like them small and juicy I think!
 
Watch out for the lethal prickles on the hawthorn.
 
I doubt they would eat hawthorn, it's very woody. They do like bramble though, newer shoots are better though, then the leaves are very green still. Don't worry about thorns, they do soften after being picked for a few hours.
 
Not the thorns on hawthorn ,stay sharp forever.
 
I was referring to the bramble thorns Christine, I did advise against feeding Hawthorn purely for the fact i'm sure there is some thing in the plant that is an irritant in the bark/thorns as when i've scratched my arm on my hawthorn it was horrendously itchy. The fruit & flowers are edible for people though ... dont know if piggies could eat them though ...
 
Thought thats what you meant but just thought I,d better make it clear just in case!My piggies will eat tender young hawthorn and the fallen leaves which land in their outdoor area,in fact they will eat all sorts of leaves as they fall especially beech apple and pear.
 
i got soft meadow hay from dust free hay co recently. Was my first order with them and it had THORNS in it. I never noticed til i lifted benson out for a cuddle and got a really sharp scratch from hay attached to his foot. Don.t know what plant it was and luckily the piggies seem fine but really sore for me. It.s put me off ordering from them again.
 
Thank you for the advice everyone :) I will try them with some of the younger brambles and see what they think (lord knows I've got enough of the stuff. Keep digging the dratted stuff out and it just keeps coming back. No decent blackberries on it to eat either or I wouldn't mind quite so much haha)
 
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