10 things for Hedgehogs: Part 7 Fast Food

 

Fast food - Did you know that Hedgehogs were lactose intolerant? 

Did you know that hedgehogs have to reach a minimum weight in order to survive hibernation? Around  600-650g or they won't wake up. 

Locally food grown in gardens and fields and woodlands including beetles, worms and earwigs, for all of the nutritional value. But sometimes they can't find enough food.

Some of this is because of our impacts on the environment through:

1. Physically removing or degrading habitats so they support less prey species and smaller populations 
2. Chemically poisoning habitats (pesticides) which remove hole groups of animals which others rely on for food. 
3. Climate change, causing changes in weather patterns that might wake hibernating animals up early at times when food is naturally scarce. 

Hedgehogs can be helped through supplementary feeding, but did you know that some foods are bad for their health?

As the great team at www.hedgehog-rescue.org.uk says, 

Please don't give them:

• Milk and milk based products- danger danger! Hedgehogs, and most other animals after weaning, are lactose intolerant. The resulting diarrhoea can kill!!!!
• Bread, cakes, biscuits - all of the stodgy food (high which can be high in sugars and little to no nutrients, just fills them up and stops them looking for nutritious food (just like ducks being feed bread).
• Mealworms -  High in Phosphorus, low in calcium, this can cause The metabolic bone disease (MBD) in hedgehogs, resulting in fractures and deformities especially in developing little ones.
• Peanuts and Sunflower hearts - Like Mealworms, too high in phosphorus and too low in calcium. Peanuts can also get stuck across the roof of a hedgehog's mouth preventing it eating.

Join our social media campaign using art to showcase the impacts of our 10 things, on wildlife, especially hedgehogs - we are challenging everyone to take part. 

Draw - Photograph - Sculpt - Act -Mime etc. and post on all platforms. Please tag @HogFriendly @SHkingstonuni and as many different people as possible - ask them to make their own version and then keep spreading the word. Use #Hedgehoghelpers #KUHoglets #HHfacts on all of your posts so that we can try to find them. 

Lets try to take over social media with #Hedgehoghelpers #HHfacts

Things you can do: Best fast food for hedgehogs in autumn and winter

• Feed them food like cat food (wet and dry)
• Commercial hedgehog food such as Spike.
• Meaty dog food.
• and a dish of water. 
• To stop most other animals like cats, dogs and foxes stealing hedgehog food, build a hedgehog feeding station in the area of your garden where you see them. This link from www.HedgehogStreet.org has food tips and ideas for easy feeding stations that you can build.