A welcome guest!

i would love one of those!!

It is a baby, or teenager :)
How cute! I love these little guys. There aren´t many gardeners which can say they have hedgehogs in their gardens.

Thanks for that info, Katarina. I don't really know anything about hedgehogs. We have had them for years. One once walked across the patio, straight between my husband's legs and under his chair into the border! I have a big old pile of old pruned branches and woody stuff in the corner and I think that's where they live. Should I feed them - I never have.

I'm a bit jealous Melchi... we used to have lots of them some time ago but they all vanished. We are close to a town centre....lots of foxes and plenty birds but no hedgehogs now. We always had a party in the garden in August that went on all day and far into the night. The hedgehogs would fascinate the guests, running round their feet and crunching stuff in the border. The children loved to see them so unafraid.

I am sorry you have "lost" your hedgehogs, Dorjac. Ours aren't as unafraid as that, and it's always a bit of a treat to see them. My sister has a family in her amazing wildlife garden. They come to the back door where she puts out food every night.

They like milk! :)

Right-ho, Katarina!

...and have a lot of fleas :)))

I knew that one!!!

No hedgehogs, but yesterday, a very healthy looking fox grazing ? sunflower seed spilt from the feeders above. Did a movie of him at about 4pm lasting about 2 minutes. He rounded off the 'feast' with a drink out of the birdbath......... Hedgehogs have no ability to digest lactose in milk. This is on page 66 of Complete Hedgehog by Jim Stocker founder of Tiggiwinkles. They may lap it up but it aint good for them.

Will definitely heed your warning, Dorjac. Pigeons get all the spilt birdseed here - and trample the plants. I do have a feeder conveniently sited beside a perch for them, though, so I can't complain!

I do like them except when my dogs find them first, they don`t hurt them but I`m wary of them because of the fleas, anyway the hogs don`t like being treated as toys....

I don't often see them - I just happened to have my camera handy. I like to think of them munching away at the slugs!

Never, NEVER feed hedgehogs milk, Katarina! It gives them terrible indigestion, makes them very ill and can kill them!
We used to have loads of hedgehogs in our garden and cellar, where they came to sleep eat all the cat food and hibernate, but this last dreadful winter has killed them off. No sign of any at all. Very, very sad.

:o)))))))) added to favourites.

Lovely isn't he? I haven't seen sight nor sound since the day I took this photo, but that is par for the course - I shouldn't think I see a hedgehog even once a year. I was so glad I had my camera with me!

I am devastated to say that our many hedgehogs have not reappeared this year. The dreadful winter must have seen them off.

Oh I am sorry to hear that, Gattina. I think mine live in a large and unruly pile of old wood and branch cuttings in the corner of my wild patch. I'm sure they're the reason my slug population seems to have declined (although they are out in force in this wet and drizzly spell - hope it's over soon, it's miserable!)

A grusome/windy horrible day yesterday. Heavy rain and squalls coming through all the time. Saw 3 Goldfinches on our seed feeders, which is first time. Sad no hedgehogs. Seems so strange how few there are around now.

This is turning into a rather unpleasant summer! Thank goodness OH and I are able to take advantage of any good weather that comes along - if the sun is out in the garden, so are we! If we were still at work, our experience of the season would be woeful indeed!

I should hate to gloat, but we've been out in the garden today, lunching under the trees and falling asleep in the sunshine!

Good for you - I'm sure our turn will come!! (We have had some nice days already - why does a week of poor weather seem so long?!)

We're getting your left-over bad stuff now - rain, chilly and shutters crashing around, but it's forecast nice again for tomorrow!

Well - here's hoping! It hasn't been too bad here today.

I've always had hedgehogs in the garden but have not seen one so far this year. Lovely pic Melchi :o)

Thanks - haven't had a sighting since!

We had loads last year - babies, too, but so far this year, nothing. :o(

The babies ran round my feet on the patio 2 years ago..

What a lovely photo!

Ours have come back! Hooray! Not so many, and not so bold, but they are there. So happy!

Thank you, Suey!

I am so pleased to hear that, Gattina. I haven't spotted this little fellow since, but I'm sure he's around. He'll have enjoyed plenty of snacks this year - I hope!

We were a bit concerned the other day to find out that badgers EAT hedgehogs, and the Wikipedia page said that where there were badgers, you don't find hedgehogs! (presumably since they've all been eaten!) We've definitely got the Badgers, and I haven't seen our Mrs Tiggywinkle for a week or so. Oh Dear!

Every creature has its turn in our gardens. Once it was hedgehogs and no foxes. Now foxes and no hedgehogs. Hopefully no badgers, as we are near the town centre. They can be so destructive and belong in open country but we are really the intruders. Like pigeons ate all the jostaberries. Fortunately they do not like blackberries. So some to give away and for pies and jam.

The blackberries on the school site have finally climbed the embankment and reached our back wall, so I hope to have plenty this year! They're not ripe yet, of course, but there looks to be good potential there!

We have big bushes full of thousands of blackberries, but I doubt they'll come to anything - it's been too dry, and they won't fill out and ripen properly. Sob!

:-( How is your weather? Have you had any rain yet?

I suppose Melchi you have had the usual awful weather of latter years, that my brother has near Warrington in Cheshire, rain, rain, rain and rain again. Poor Gattina has a bad drought. Yesterday we had a massive thunderstorm that stretched about 30 miles across and let down such torrents that I had to stop driving for a while in a side road. Just before the storm came over....so did a Battle of Britain Flight Lancaster bomber, which came low over North Weald airfield on the way from an airshow. I hope he got out of the way of the storm too.

No, unfortunately Mel, not a drop yet, but we had a thunderstorm on Saturday - lots of crashing and banging and flashing, but no rain. I think someone else must have got that. Most summers are pretty dry, but it's never been as bad as this before.

It is difficult for so many people, Gattina. I have said several times that we on the NW coast have had it easy, but even that isn't altogether true. I was talking to someone who has a greenhouse not far away from here, on the Ribble estuary. He grows pitcher plants and similar. He said he had been flooded out because of high tides and groundwater. Although - fortunately - it hadn't caused lasting damage, he was pretty fed up about it. And just 10 miles away, there was a village that was completely cut off for a while - no way in, or out! And there's you without water, which must cause big problems for a lot of people. It has certainly been a difficult year, weatherwise. Not being able to sit out and enjoy the garden is the very least of it.

Dorjac - I think we are very lucky to have very little extreme weather in Southport. My mother lives only 2 miles inland, but has more rainfall, and more frosts than we do. It has been exceedingly grey this year, though! We had some thunder in the last two days, but we were on the very edge of it and didn't get much rain.

I hope the Lancaster was ok (I'm sure it was!) I just love to see them (or is it "it"?) It occasionally comes to the air show here. Fantastic sound. It must have been an awesome and terrible sight to see them taking off during WWII.

I've been chatting to all our neighbours this evening (doing a bit of passeggiata'ing) and apparently only a couple of hundred miles or so away up in the Tirol, there have been floods and mudslides after torrential rains. So we know who's been getting our rain!

Oh lovely. :)
We had some years ago - they used to make a nest under our shed, but we had to move the shed & although they came into the garden for a while they never made a nest in the garden again.
Now I never see any and haven't done for years.
Pity, I used to love watching for them to appear on the lawn at dusk on warm evenings!!

Not that we get many warm evenings nowadays!! :(

I haven't thoroughly read all the comments Katerina, so I don't know if anyone has mentioned it, but if you do feed them, give them cat or dog food, not too much bread and never give them milk, it's not good for them.

Thank you for your comment, Shirley.

I've haven't seen my little visitor since I took this photo, but I live in hope!

Maybe he's been hibernating.

Probably - I've a big "wood" (garden waste!) pile in the corner. I imagine it's home to quite a lot of things!

That's wonderful, your own conservation project!! :))

Yes! Although I'm thinking of getting some of it taken away later this year (not until the bulbs in the wild patch are finished, or they'll be trampled to death). I have prevaricated for years, but it is getting very large and out of hand now, and has a huge amount of ivy behind it, growing up my neighbour's fence. It'll inevitably disturb its residents, but if the bottom 2ft is left, I hope to minimize that. And in a month or so, any slumbering guests should be well awake!