These delightful nocturnal creatures are the UK’s only spiny mammal with a distinctive coat containing around 6000 sharp spines. Hedgehogs as we know them have been around for about 15 million years, but as individuals they tend to lead solitary lives, rarely living for more than 5 years. The young are born in litters of 3 – 5 ‘hoglets’ with their spines, little more than hairs at the time, hidden beneath soft skin.

As their name suggests they live in and around hedgerows and slightly untidy land where they forage for food. They mostly eat snails and slugs but will scavenge for anything they can find so are beneficial to any garden. Typically, a hedgehog will travel up to 2km a night hunting for food, which means they need access to a fair expanse of land, ideally an area the size of several football pitches.

Hedgehogs need our help
But like so much of our wildlife hedgehogs are in decline largely due to a loss of habitat. Larger fields and fewer hedges have hit the countryside populations, whilst ever more housing estates and roads impact on the urban ones. Hence, like so many species, they need our help wherever possible. The easiest way is to be a slightly untidy gardener, leaving a heap of leaves or logs in quiet corners, or keeping a patch of longer grass scattered with fallen leaves.

Unfortunately, many gardens are securely fenced in these days, restricting a hedgehog’s access to the larger areas they need to forage in order to survive. Therefore, it is important for small communities to work together to create ‘wildlife corridors’, which simply involves cutting a small 12cm hole in fences at ground level to allow hedgehogs to get into adjoining gardens.

An incredible sense of smell
They also need fresh water so something like a large plastic ‘flowerpot saucer’ sunk into the ground is ideal. If you have a pond make sure you have at least one gentle sloping area to allow any hedgehog that falls into it a place to climb out. Hedgehogs have very poor eyesight so they do fall into ponds occasionally. They do however have an incredible sense of smell and can sniff out a worm or slug at an inch or more underground.

Check the base of bonfires before igniting
Last month I wrote about the need for providing wildlife shelter over the winter period. Hedgehogs hibernate from November until March so if you have been preparing a pile of logs, wood and other combustible debris in preparation of a Guy Fawkes or any other bonfire, you must appreciate that your bonfire heap will simply appear as a lovely snug winter refuge to any hedgehog.

It is imperative that you check the base of the bonfire for hedgehogs or other wildlife such as frogs and toads before igniting it. An ideal solution is to collate your bonfire heap on a spare bit of space and transfer it to the burning site on the day you intend to light it. That way you can be sure you are not adding to the decline of our wildlife.

For more information about supporting, feeding and watching hedgehogs in your neighbourhood visit www.hedgehogstreet.org and check out their campaign.