Hedgehog Population Boom?

Hi and welcome to this site.Unfortunately we have not seen any hedgehogs for many years, but we live close to the inner city.They must be lurking somewhere. We need them in our garden to help out the frogs and toad to keep the slug and snail population under control. Any exports to Bristol will be gratefully received!

Welcome2GOY Gardenalfresco , What a Wonderful Blog 2 hear youve seen So Many Hoggys is Great News :) As u must know we cant have Enough Wildlife how its dissappearing in the UK ,Thanx 4 letting us Know :)

Hello Gardenalfresco. I hope you enjoy G O Y. I just wrote a comment on another blog that I haven't seen any hedgehogs for some years. I hope you're right in saying there's been an explosion in their population.

There are quite a few at the bottom of our garden as it backs on to woods. Dont see so many slugs though.
Shall check out your garden alfresco site. Does it come with discount for GOY members?

Maybe they all evacuated to your village for some reason. We live in Hungary and see a few hedgehogs, but not as many as we used to see when we lived in UK, but that was nearly 13 years ago and things could have changed.

welcome Gardenalfresco . we have hedgehogs in our garden ,they leave their tell tale deposits everywhere I use to put food out and watch them come for it , but I had to stop that because of encouraging the rats YUK .

Thanks for such great replies and such a warm welcome. I've ordered a couple of hedgehogs to get to Bristol ASAP, they were a bit prickly at first but they ran off in the right direction - hope they make it :0)

Chrispook - UK hedgie numbers have been in a steady decline over the years i'm afraid - hopefully this 'summer' will have helped :0) When it's hot and dry they tend to suffer as there is less food slithering around (snails, slugs etc) They love dog/cat food from a tin, but as Amy says so do rats! - but then again shouldn't Amy's mini tiger have something to say about rats in the garden? LOL

Treesandthings - I've just set up a 10% discount for GOY members - please just use 'GOY' as the discount code :0)

Thanks for sending them in our direction. If we hear lots of snuffling and find lots of empty snail shells we will know that they have taken up residence!

NEVER GIVE HEDGIES BREAD OR COWS MILK. They cannot digest milk and it gives them severe diarrhoea, which leads to dehydration and death within a couple of days. You can feed them hedgehog milk - but I've never seen any sold in supermarkets :0)

Hey! please save some for me! I suppose I can always ask Grenville to bring them down for me... :-0 Welcome to GOY especially as you come with gifts!

Iv seen few Hedgehogs strolling down my street@1&2am in the morning :) They can move very Fast when they want you know? :)

hi, welcome to GOY, we have seen quiet a few hedgehogs around here this yr, including one that came into our garden. i have never seen so many slugs or snails before this summer, i recon the last 2 damp summers have something to do with it

Hi, Brad, and welcome.

I've just looked at your website. Very good, with unusual ornaments. Some of your gargoyles look scary enough to frighten away the slugs and snails !

Sorry to hear there are very few Hungarian hedgehogs. Maybe Tiggywinkles Wildlife Hospital which rescues hedgehogs should set up a sub-branch in Budapest especially for Chrispook.

It's great to know that this cold, wet summer is having at least some good effects, resulting in more hedgehogs around. Maybe GOY can systematically distribute them evenly across the UK !

Can't wait to see a photo of the jurassic slug, eh, Brad.
You could start selling a new line in garden ornaments -
prehistoric slugs and snails.

Hi Brad - Welcome to GoY! I've only seen one hodgeheg in my garden this year. I read with interest your comments re only given hodgehegs hedgehog milk. Tell me, how does one go about milking a hedgehog? I presume protective gloves would be involved in the process?

Hi Sid,

I was only joking - sorry I've a slightly warped sense of humour. However, I do know that you definately shouldn't give them cows milk. As I have confused you, I promise to stand in the 'corner of shame' for at least three hours, please accept my apologies.

With no toilet breaks!!!!

Oh, dear. My effort at doing a funny seems to have totally backfired on me. Not the first time either.... I'll join you in the corner if you like. Not sure about the no toilet breaks tho, could get messy......

OMG lol Well i liked it Sid lol classic ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺☺

Thanks Kev x-)

No probs Sid ☺☺☺☺

Hi Sid -

I honestly thought you were joking but I didn't want to take the chance of the RSPCA knocking on my door, demanding to know why I'm advising the public to milk female hedgehogs LOL :0)

You can never be too careful :0)