Sad news I'm afraid about the little hedgehog who had been speared by a fork. Although the wounds healed well, it was found that even the strong antibiotics couldn't fight the infection in her body. While she was at the vet's for an xray she went downhill so fast that the kindest thing to do was to put her to sleep. Please keep spreading the word about checking for hedgehogs.
After quite a few months gap without visitors (we believe our last two regulars succumbed to cars) we had a new visitor last night which crazy rescue dog Dudley discovered.
Clearly quite a young hog, probably half the size / weight of the adults we are used to. We fed him / her last night and will continue to do so in the hope they bulk up before hibernation time.
Three - possibly four visitors here last night - believe it or not there is a terracotta dish full of hog biscuits under two ofthem and there weren't many left after they had been scoffing them! The bowl of water is behind their food box. In one picture you can see the orange skirted slug which appear to have bred prolifically this year.
Just you wait @AnniD, one is bound to come along and before you know it will be eating in your garden. This year we have lost so many due to one crisis or another, and now we are blessed with 3 or 4 again. We were down to 1 or possibly 2 last month so these are a real surprise to us.
We have found that the hogs prefer the common small black slugs (sorry I don't know what they are called) and ignore these larger orange skirt slugs - I must say I don't blame them.
Fingers crossed @Guernsey Donkey2. We are waiting for the weather to improve in order to clear out the hedgehog house for the winter. Who knows, there maybe a resident in situ already.
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Clearly quite a young hog, probably half the size / weight of the adults we are used to. We fed him / her last night and will continue to do so in the hope they bulk up before hibernation time.
Fingers crossed. Nice to have them back with us.
Still no sign of any hedgehogs here, sadly.