James Harcourt
Why hedgehogs need a helping hand
There was a time when a hedgehog shuffling across the lawn at dusk was unremarkable in Britain. Not any more. Since the 1950s our hedgehog population has fallen dramatically, and the species is now listed as vulnerable on the red list of British mammals. The countryside has lost hedgerows, field margins and rough pasture, so gardens — and the way they connect to one another — have become genuinely important. A single garden is rarely enough for a hedgehog, which may roam up to two kilometres in a night. A street of gardens, joined together, can be everything.
The good news is that most of what helps hedgehogs is cheap, simple and improves the garden for all sorts of other wildlife too. Here is how to make yours part of the network.
Small gaps, big difference
The single most useful thing you can do is cut a hole. Hedgehogs cannot climb, and a solid fence or wall is an impassable barrier. A gap just 13 centimetres square — roughly the size of a CD case — is all a hedgehog needs, and it is too small to let most pets wander.
- Cut a notch at the base of a fence panel, or lift one panel slightly and trim the bottom edge.
- If you have concrete gravel boards, knock out a section or replace a short length with a piece of timber cut to size.
- Keep the gap clear. Leaf litter, long grass and creeping ivy will quietly close it within a season.
- Talk to your neighbours. Two or three households working together turn a row of gardens into a proper hedgehog highway, and a gap on each boundary is far better than one lonely hole.
Water, food and the slug pellet question
Hedgehogs are thirsty, especially in dry spells, and a steep-sided bowl is a drowning hazard. Put out a shallow dish, no more than four or five centimetres deep, with gently sloping sides. Add a few flat pebbles inside so a small animal can scramble out, and site it on the ground near cover. Refresh it daily.
Feeding is optional — a garden rich in beetles, caterpillars, earthworms and slugs provides the natural diet. If you do feed, offer meaty cat or dog food (not fish-based) or a proper hedgehog food, and never milk or bread, which cause serious digestive problems.
Slug pellets are the worst thing you can leave out. A slug that has eaten pellets becomes a poisoned meal, and hedgehogs that eat them suffer internal bleeding and often die. Metaldehyde is no longer approved for outdoor garden use in the UK, but other pellets remain on sale, and even the iron-phosphate types can harm the earthworms and soil life that underpin the whole food chain. Deal with slugs the slow way instead: a torchlit evening patrol, a beer trap sunk with its rim above soil level so hedgehogs cannot fall in, and encouragement for frogs, beetles and slow worms. Skip insecticides and weedkillers for the same reason.
Shelter and a healthy bit of mess
Hedgehogs need somewhere to sleep by day and to hibernate from roughly November to March. A tidy garden offers very little. A little purposeful untidiness works wonders:
- Leave a corner of long grass and nettles unmown.
- Build a log pile — a heap of prunings and logs, with dry leaves tucked in, is prime hedgehog real estate.
- Let a leaf pile stand through the winter rather than clearing it in autumn.
- Keep a compost heap, but take care when turning it.
- Plant a native hedge, or let an existing one thicken at the base.
A purpose-built hedgehog house is a lovely addition. Site it in shade, in a quiet corner, with the entrance turned away from the prevailing wind, and line it with dry leaves. Once occupied, leave it strictly alone until spring.
Year-round safety checks
Many hedgehog deaths in gardens are entirely preventable accidents.
- Bonfires: build the pile on the day you intend to light it, or lift it carefully with a torch first. A heap left sitting for a week is exactly the sort of place a hedgehog chooses for a nap.
- Strimmers and mowers: check long grass before cutting, especially between May and September when hoglets are about.
- Netting: keep fruit and vegetable netting pegged taut and at least 30 centimetres above the ground.
- Ponds: always provide a shallow sloping edge, a stone ramp or a piece of roughened timber so anything that falls in can climb out.
- Drains, holes and steep-sided containers: cover them, or pop in a ramp.
Watching and recording what you see
Once the gaps and the water dish are in place, the pleasure is in the noticing. Sit quietly at dusk with a red-filtered torch — red light disturbs nocturnal animals far less than white — and give yourself twenty undisturbed minutes.
A nature journal turns those glimpses into something valuable. Note the date, time and weather, then describe what you saw. Was the hedgehog large and dark, or small and pale-spined? A juvenile is noticeably smaller, with softer, lighter spines. What was it doing — snuffling through the border, drinking, gathering leaves? Prick up your ears for the loud, rhythmic snuffling that often gives a hedgehog away before you see it.
Signs are worth recording too: droppings are dark, shiny and full of beetle cases, often left on a lawn overnight, and a neat bundle of leaves in a sheltered corner may be a day nest. If you spot a hoglet out in late autumn that looks small — under about 600 grams — it may not survive hibernation without help, so contact a local hedgehog rescue for advice rather than intervening blindly. And do pass your records on to your county wildlife recording scheme; those everyday garden sightings add up to real evidence about how these animals are faring.
