Hedgehogs chose my garden ! Anyone else know about feeding etc

[Piffle]

T'oyher night we saw two hedgehogs in our garden.
have done a little t'internet research and see cat food is something they like. this makes sense a we feed our cat outside, so they have obvioulsy been attracted by her food.
I know hedgehogs are declining in numbers and admit to having a soft spot for them as creatures for 30 years due a to a book I read as a kid.
The one thing I worry about is that they are now dependent on the food and that I should make a special effort to help them.
internet says that feeding is a good thing on thw whole.
Does anyone else do this at all? Or am I losing it in my old age?

No rotting apples. My parents have a hedgehog in their garden and it ate the fallen apples from thier tree. They will slightly fermented and apparently the hedgehog was weaving all over the garden . (not actually sure if this is true as my dad is prone to story telling).

Ok sorted, no apple trees in our garden. :)

I wouldn't put food out every day, maybe every third day. Solves the dependency problem.

Don't be surprised it they vanish for days at a time. Hedgehogs tend to make a few nests in different places and constantly migrate between them.

they are crawling with fleas you know

water only not milk

we looked after a baby hedghog once, after rescuing it from some kids who were trying to use it as a football, it was only 200g in weight

cat food and water is pretty much all you need, not milk, it is not good for them

Cool they were out again last night, snuffling around. We have a pond, so I think the water supply is why they like it here too.
WE also have a deep thick conifer hedge and a lot of space under our decking. Our cat is a total waste of space hunting wise so she will not hassle them.
Today I have erected a barrier as our lawn is being treated and the treament could cause them an irritation.
I now need to name them

Not another 'Spike,' I hope... we can surely do better than that ?

Erm... Sylvester has always struck me as a magnificent name for a hedgehog.

We have them in our garden and the watermeadows next to us- read \link{http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/04/29/nhog29.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/04/29/ixhome.html\here}

How lovely!
We have a family of hedgies who have visited us for nearly two years now-if we don't put the food out by 10pm (whiskas pouches) then they tread on the late so it bangs on the patio!

Really sadly had to take one to the vets last week to be humanely destroyed as I found her swollen,lying in the front garden in daylight.Convinced she had been poisoned by slugs which had eaten pellets rather than hit by a car......

I think they are fab and eat loads of slugs and Greensleeves who cares if they are full of fleas? I don't take them to bed with me and my cats are "advantaged" regularly-no problem!

I know we had our lawn treated for soem lawn eating grubs and the guy was saying keep your kids off the grass and keep your cat off it (no prob there) then I asked him about the hedgies and he said he didn;t know, so I told him to find out first :)
Hub were I to call one Sylvester I would be duty bound by my 3 yr old to name the other one Tweety
WE have settled on
Cabernet and Sauvignon
Or Cab Sav to their friends :)

I was just being curmudgeonly

They are adorable little things really, especially the baby ones

Ahh-so you're a softie really

Yup

HH fleas can only live on HHs.

\link{http://www.britishhedgehogs.org.uk/\british hedgehog preservation society"

\link{http://www.britishhedgehogs.org.uk/\british hedgehog preservation society}

oh how lovely, I love these little critters too. I like a human name for animals, our terrier was called Trevor! Horacio, Harry, Hedgehog

Cab Sav sounds dandy. There will be lots of slugs this evening for them if you've had rain !

Hav we had rain... oh yes, the hedgehog folks says slugs area last resort for the HH!
Mind you the starlings were here in the hundreds today flocking over our slugs in the rain (the cat slept through this of course)
They have been out every night after 10 ish.