Just found five bodies in my garden

[TibetanTerra]

NC but regular poster. I just went out to the garden and saw something on the lawn that looked a bit like a hedgehog. At first I thought it was a ball of dead grass, but then saw it covered in bluebottles. Looked closer and it's definitely a dead hedgehog

Thought it was weird, but as I glanced further down the lawn I saw THREE more, perfectly still, and covered in flies.

I assume(d) that possibly it was a little family that had been poisoned, as it looks like they've just dropped dead on their walk across the lawn. But then I found a dead rat, ripped in half with entrails everywhere but the top half intact and it's clearly a youngish rat, not a mouse. The hedgehogs don't look injured, no blood or wounds.

Also found two halves of an eggshell (like stolen from a nest, not the supermarket!) in two completely opposite ends of the garden.

What the actual fuck. What's killed all the wildlife!? I have a cat but she's not really a hunter, ignores hedgehogs and if she did manage a rat she'd just leave it intact and not shred it to bits.

I do have pics but didn't want to upset people, but I can post them.

Any ideas what has been on a murderous rampage in my garden? Nothing like this has ever happened before.

Nothing to add except to say how horrible for you

You can buy a hedgehog house for your garden so this never happens again!

I think the hedgehogs were poisoned and rat was a cat.

Also foxes do not kill for sport they kill as much as they can when the opportunity arises and then stash it. If anything is left behind it normally means they have been disturbed.

I have found dead hedgehogs and rats when neighbours put rat poison down. I dont know if it was a coincidence.

I saw a dead hedgehog today. Plus some remains of another animal. But in a city it won’t be badgers. Foxes probably, three foxes woke us the other night playing in the middle of a busy road. Can they die of fright?

@LakieLady what type of corpse would have warfarin? Human or pet I presume.

www.hedgehogstreet.org/find-dead-hedgehog/

Hedgehogs don’t do too well with some pesticides. I looked after some once who were taken to the vet by a lady who had sprayed her garden heavily with a new pesticide and they’d consumed it somehow... two survived, four didn’t. It could be something like that...
Or rat poison.

It’s really sad

If a badger kills a hedgehog it would be for food, and the corpse wouldnt be untouched. My guess is poison, with something (cat? Fox ?) then feeding on the rat.

Maybe a fox - could have just startled them to death or messed about with them.

Foxes are truly vicious, horrible, vindictive creatures and too many people romanticise them.

Or you could have a psycho in your neighbourhood?

I expect pesticide or some other poison killed them all, and something tried to eat the rat but abandoned it when it tasted /sensed the poison

With 4 untouched hedgehog corpses that all look like they've died the same length of time ago it must be poisoning. No predator could or would catch and kill 4 at the same time and leave them all untouched in the same place.

I guess the rat was also poisoned and a cat or fox had a go at the corpse.

How awful. Please inform neighbours who may think they are killing pests that they are massacring hedgehogs too.

Slug pellets? They are lethal for hedgehogs

If there’s no damage it’s unlikely to be a predator. Contact a local wildlife rescue and they should help.
If it’s poison, you need to find out and alert neighbours with regards their pets and also find out who has put it out, no need for it at all.

In all my years of owning cats, they have killed rats but never eaten them or attempted to tear apart, they leave the bodies outside my back door.
It's as if the cats know not to due to disease.

I would guess at them being poisoned, someone has put down rat poison 😢

Contact a local wildlife rescue and they will probably to a post-mortem to conform what happened.

A fox would not do this, pretty rare a badger would either, I see them all feeding alongside each other often.

Fox

If there are no visible injuries it is not a fox or a badger.
It's highly likely it is chemicals or poison.
I would contact a hedgehog charity to see if they can investigate.

And I'm at the poster who thinks wildlife can be horrible and vindictive - that's really only human emotions...

"Or you could have a psycho in your neighbourhood"

@ShastaBeast rat/ mouse poison is warfarin (or similar) - the crawl through small spaces causing a bleed into their brain and then die.

OP my cat leaves rats that look as if they've been frightened to death, never injured. So I guess a bigger animal could do the same to the hodgehegs, sounds like it's worth asking if the neighbours have put poison down somewhere less than secure though before there are more bodies.

@Eckhart

I imagine the rat was poisoned and the hedgehogs ate it in your garden.

Horrible, OP, what an unpleasant thing to happen, and to find

This seems possible, would the poison work that quickly though? They've all eaten the rat and keeled over in probably minutes? The furthest hog is probably 15ft away, the nearest just 3ish ft.

Lots of the neighbours have dogs or cats, and the neighbours at the back have two kids under 5 too. I should probably put notes in everyone's doors.

We have foxes that hang around in our garden nightly. We have had a whole family of dead birds just left in the garden, don't always eat or destroy what they kill.

I don't think Mr Brock kills for fun.

Just trying to figure out why you'd namechange for this.

@Nandocushion

Just trying to figure out why you'd namechange for this.

Because I knew I'd have to speak to some neighbours and was considering posting on my neighborhood FB group too. If any of them are on here they could then ASe and find out all my secrets

I have foxes and hedgehogs in my garden - they leave each other alone. Badgers will go for hedgehogs, but the foxes seem to give them a wide berth.

Sounds like poison with so many dead at the same time.

Oh such a horrible thing for you to find op. I hope you get to the bottom of it.