Fleece Hay Rack How-to

Front of finished hay rack (with a few strands of hay)

I went through my fleece scraps last week, to make some items for the Boston Pignic.  When I made the hay racks, I jotted down the size and instructions.  There's not much to them.  The following can be adjusted to whatever size works best for your guinea pigs.

Start with the following pieces of fleece:

•  one 5 x 11" strip
•  four 1.5 x 10" strips

Lay out the pieces, all right sides down (or, I realized after I took the photo, all right sides up, with the large rectangle underneath the little strips).  Pin in place.

Stitch each of the thin strips to the large strip, close to the edge of the thin strip (see bottom photo).  Start at the top of the hay rack (the edge where all of the pieces line up evenly), stitch down the side of the thin strip, then turn and stitch along the bottom to the opposite edge, and then back up to the top.  Repeat for the remaining three strips.  The stitching will look like a big "U" on each of the thin strips.  This is the back of the hay rack.

Fold the strip ends that were left hanging over the wrong side of the large piece of fleece.  Match the edges to the top of the hay rack.  Pin in place.  Stitch along the top edge, across all four strips, about 1/4" from the top edge.

Hay rack back (to show all of the stitching)

I punched holes with a paper punch, about 1/2" from the top two corners to attach the hooks.  Be careful not to nick the stitching (see top photo).

I've really liked this hay rack.  It has passed the guinea pigs' inspection as well.  Threading the hay through it takes a bit of practice, but once I got the hang of it, it's easy to fill.  Pinniped and Cannoli seem to pull the hay out easy enough, yet I haven't had them dump all of the contents of the rack, like they have with other hay racks.