Who else is helping hedgehogs?

[Alicewond]

They may be declining in rural areas but growing in urban ones. I have at least 3, are you feeding or watering them. Do your hogs have names

Hi RaptorWhiskas. Adult hedgehogs can climb steps no worries unless they are particularly big. An adult can pull themselves up 30cm/12" babies occasionally struggle. Access to extra gardens is great it helps with mating and increasing the population as well as feeding. Obviously you'd need permission from all concerned to have holes about the size of a CD case hogs are happy to trundle through the gardens even if they can only get access through yours. As the saying goes - every little helps!

My house is on a hill. I have a dozen steps up the alley at the side of the house to reach the back garden gate. Then a tiny paved area and several more steps to reach the lawn and flowerbeds which are level with the upstairs bedroom window. It would have to be a pretty committed hedgehog to climb all those steps!

I have considered putting a hog house or something on the little flowerbed at the front of my house because that’s at street level. But not sure if it would be of any interest to them.

I have never seen a hedgehog in Northern Ireland. I only saw a couple when living in England.

If there are some here, how do I encourage them?

There are a million cats in this neighborhood, always going through my garden though.

myself and neighbours have had them visiting for years. We have dug holes under our fences etc and put water and cat food out. My cat knows not to eat it

We had an injured hog in our garden a few weeks ago. We caught him, housed him in the bath overnight with some towels, food, and a heat pad, then took him to the vets next morning. They gave him back to us for re-release into our garden and we haven't seen him since, I'm hoping he's still around but I can't leave cat food down as next doors cats will eat it. We have very few slugs though so maybe he is there still.

This is him. The DC named him Arthur.

I really want to but we're too well fenced in, I asked DH to make a hole in the bottom so they could get in but apparently there's a concrete 'step' under that which will make our garden inaccessible, still. Shame though as our garden is chock full of slugs and snails and I'd love a bit of help getting rid of them.

I do however put a dish with stones in it in our front garden for the hogs and birds.

We have had an explosion of hedgehogs locally according the local wildlife people. They put it down almost completely to recent badger population controls in the area.

We have gaps at the bottom of the fences and put out some leftover cat food for the two or three that come snuffing through.

It’s a race between the neighbourhood cats and the hedgehogs to get it after that 😁

Our cats are interested in them, but don’t touch!

We have hedgehogs, about five of them come each night. They get special hedgehog food and lactose-free cheese (though in reality, the first hog to visit polishes off all the cheese). We use an upturned plastic storage box with a door cut into it to feed them, which seems to keep the rats out. We also have a couple of hog houses which they use.

A couple of years ago, we found a couple of baby hedgehogs in our pond and had to fish them out. No sign of the parents so we took them to the vets and one of the nurses looked after them all winter as they were too small to hibernate.

RaptorWhiskas yes would have to be pretty committed but they are a little crackers. Food and water at the front would be great. They'd probably only use the house for eating if you put food in it away from cats. They usually like to sleep in hidden places. Thank you for caring about them.

Me, I found one outside during the day when it was hot a few weeks ago, helped it as much as I could on advice but it unfortunately died :( I now have extra water bowls out around my block of flats and keep an extra eye out for them. Saw two the other morning and left them some food but they had gone back into hiding when I was back from work.

Morality, just cheap cat, kitten or puppy biscuits and a bowl of water. Hogs are lactose intolerant so just be careful of milk content in some kitten biscuits. Having a messy garden or a messy patch at least helps. They are an edge animal so don't like wide open spaces they are also quite shy and private. There are plastic tub feeding station instructions all over the internet though cats can be very determined!

Ooh we have none that I know of but planning to overwinter some from a local rescue this winter!

Jonsnowsghost, I'm sorry it passed away. I'm afraid often by the time they ask for help they are beyond saving and just break hearts instead. Water is so important for all wildlife.

GC Academic glad the little ones are ok. Hogs swim well but only for a limited time so they need a pond exit strategy even if that is a pile of stones to the side, a ramp or trailing ivy to pull up on. They are amazing climbers though no opposable thumbs so it is scrabbling but they are impressive. A ramp or trailing plant over the concrete bit will help.

I posted on my social media to make everyone aware of leaving out water for wildlife, especially if we have the same summer as last year. I didn't realise how endangered they were, poor little hogs

I'd love to have hedgehogs visit my garden, I've made it as hog friendly as possible and have cut out a small section of the back fence so they can get in and out but we haven't seen any in years. We had loads around when I was growing up. There are badgers around here though so maybe that's why

We have at least 1 come to our garden but we don't do anything to actually look after it as it seems happy enough as it is and we have a lot of slugs and snails. There are several places in our garden for it to hide and of course we check before mowing and strimming. I did record our sighting on that "My Hedgehog Street" website.

Thank you Hedgehogrescue.

There are plenty of shrubs nearby, but I’ve been talking to a neighbour this morning who told me we do have badgers on the road. That may be the reason there are no hogs.

I’m asking for a nocturnal wildlife camera for my birthday!

So glad to hear of so many others helping the hogs :)

I put food and water out last year as I read the prolonged dry, warm weather had baked the ground hard and they had trouble digging/whatever they do for worms. I had two hogs at one point coming each night.

I don't normally feed them but I dont use slug pellets/garden chemicals and my garden has hedges rather than a fence so they can get through and hopefully find a food source. I leave a scruffy area with overgrown shrubs, old branches which I believe they like. The scruffy area is behind some trees so not an eyesore. My garden isn't massive btw.
I rarely see them now the weather has gone back to normal, but do see their poo on the lawn sometimes so think they are still around.

Yes got water, house but not had one move in for a long time.

HedgehogRescueHERBIE - following the pond incident, we have now constructed some escape routes in it for hedgehogs!

I’m asking for a nocturnal wildlife camera for my birthday!

We got one of these when we realised we had hedgehogs and started feeding them. It’s so lovely to see them on camera. Although we did find out that some hedgehogs bully others by pushing them!

How funny I saw this thread as I was scrolling through the active topics. My daughter and I are going to the local farm today to make hedgehog houses
I am really excited. I have only seen one hedgehog in real life and I’m 31! Can’t wait to set up our little house in our garden later