Just seen a hedgehog in the garden!
Anna33
Posts: 300
I'm so excited - I've just seen a hedgehog in our garden! Snuffling away munching my slugs & snails (it's more than welcome to them). It was the very last thing I expected to see, given we've got a small urban garden in the suburbs of a large town on the South Coast. I've done my best to turn it into a wildlife garden over the 18m we've lived here - mostly planting for bees and pollinators, especially with most of the gardens surrounding being a little, erm, sparse for nature.
I've been really cheered this summer by the constant influx of bees, and was pleased to have been able to do something good for nature - including seeing wool carder bees in action, and signs of leaf cutter bees. We've also had lots of hummingbird hawk moths as regular visitors (four at once yesterday).
To now find a hedgehog in the garden - I'm so chuffed, and pretty astounded! I didn't think this neighbourhood had that much wildlife to start with!
Sorry for over excitement - I just had to share! I'm a long time lurker on these boards, so it's about time I started contributing!
Posts
That is really very exciting Anna, I am green with envy.
I am rather new here myself so it would be a bit pretentious of me to welcome you to the forum, but Hi from another newbie!
It's exciting isn't it! I love seeing our hedgehogs pottering around.
Welcome to the forum.
Fantastic!!! And 'welcome aboard'
Well done! It is their way of thanking you for making an effort with nature
there's a help save the hedgehogs thread with tips about attracting them and feeding etc if you are interested! Welcome
If they are out in the day they may need extra food, or may be poorly. Cat food is good, and a bowl of water too.
We have a regular visitor, and we've seen a smaller one too on occasions.
We have a very young hedgehog visiting our garden each evening and with advice gained from this Forum I have been feeding it on dried mealworms, which it loves and the cat doesn't like them! I feel the need to fatten up this young hedgehog before the winter sets in - but still keep it hungry enough to eat a few slugs or snails it may find in the garden. I am very aware of not putting any slug pellets out because we have always had hedgehogs roaming around and I don't want to harm them or the birds for that matter
.The picture shows a mature adult feeding outside our front door. Was it nutcutlet who shared a picture of 3 or 4 hedgehogs eating together?
Welcome on board.
Waitrose chicken cat food is what I use.
We've got at least 2 coming. A huge big fella and a smaller one
I love 'em.
Awww great pic of a lovely animal
I'm sure we'd all appreciate a hedgehog in our garden to eat the odd slug or snail 
I agree with Marc, you've certainly been rewarded for your efforts with nature and wildlife
Keep up the good work :-D
Hostafan, that's great - we used to feed them with dog food, but now have two neighbourhood cats almost waiting at our door each evening, so had to find an alternative that was tempting to hedgehogs but not to the cats. The nice thing about the dried mealworms is that they keep in the tub for months and we just put a few out on a saucer each evening.
Thank you all, and if it keeps coming back I'll know just how to give it the tastiest snacks in the neighbourhood...! Thanks for the tip about the hedgehog thread - will look it up and learn more about these little cuties.
And I'll definitely be on night time vigil this evening...