July 04, 2004
Life among the hedgehogs
My native guide takes me to a secluded location known for hedge-hog sightings. We put out food and hide in our blind. (all pictures link to larger popup images).
Soon, two emerge from their lair: a mother and a young one.
Then the remaining three young hedge-hogs emerge and start wolfing down the food. They can be distinguished by the colors of their snouts, which range from dark to light. Albino hedge-hogs have been sighted in Austria, where they are relatively common, but none of these are albinos. One of the young ones has the habit of climbing completely into the food dish and standing on the food, which I conclude he does in order to have more for himself. The little runt is the last one to get any food, spending the first several minutes jockeying for position.
We are quite surprised when a fifth young hedge-hog emerges from the lair, since we only moved four to the backyard from their burrow in front of our house. No idea where this little guy came from. We assume the mother remembered him and moved him from the burrow to the back yard one night after we went to bed.
Eventually, the hedge-hogs notice the guy taking pictures of them a foot from their dish, and I back off so as not to stress them out.
I can't resist saying this : they are so very cute.
Posted by: sue at July 4, 2004 10:56 AMMy neighbors are very happy that I'm not a oh-so-cute-squeak-girlie, but use a keyboard to type they-are-cool-fellows - otherwise they might have frowned a little.
Posted by: novala at July 4, 2004 03:06 PMAhhhhhh!!!! They're lovely - and they've got great homes, by the way! Can you build me a human-size one, please, Mig?
Posted by: David (TEFL Smiler) at July 4, 2004 06:13 PMPerhaps you could set up a webcam and start your own pay-per-view baby hedgehog cam.
Posted by: paul at July 4, 2004 10:42 PMWould you prefer the straw bedding, David, or the shredded newspaper?
Posted by: mig at July 4, 2004 11:25 PMARGH! THEY ARE SO CUTE! oh boy.
Posted by: j-a at July 5, 2004 04:54 AMI ADORE hedgehogs!!! What wonderful pictures! I have hedgehog envy now, I believe.
Posted by: ArtichokeHeart at July 6, 2004 07:59 AMOh, the shredded newspaper, please, so that I have something to read. (Well, lots of very short words, at least.)
Posted by: David (TEFL Smiler) at July 6, 2004 12:13 PMHow absolutely adorable! Thanks for posting them.. I got my fix. :)
You.. you.. 5th baby hedgehog neglector, you. Poor baby hedgehog. His brothers and sisters were stolen away quite suddenly by the huge hand in the sky that smelled oddly like meat and rubber and then he shivered away all by himself.. lonely.. alone.. in the dark. *sigh*
Posted by: Carrie at July 6, 2004 05:25 PMYeah, he sticks pretty close to his mom now. I wonder if that would apply to kids - maybe if you give them a good scare when they're little, you don't have to worry about them wandering off at the mall after that.
Posted by: mig at July 6, 2004 05:43 PMEither that or they (the kids) would get extra busy sharpening their spines, in case it happens again.
Thanks for the photos. Your stories are almost like being there, but with hegehogs (and their houses! my stars, those are great hedgehog huts!) we all know the cuteness factor will be too great not to see.
So. Um. What does one feed a hedgehog? Minced baby mice? Worms? What exactly do hedgehogs root around for, that you might have dug up for them and put into their bowl?
Posted by: Jessica at July 6, 2004 05:54 PMBasically catfood, except there's a picture of a hedgehog on the can and it costs more. There is also a dry mix they eat when the other stuff runs out, which looks like muesli / granola would if your kitchen had a real bad mealworm problem. Out in nature, I hear they are little omnivores, eating nuts and berries (I will soon be chopping nuts for them, which I am told they love) and other fruit as well as grubs and slugs. Someone else told me, though, that they don't eat slugs... who knows.
Posted by: mig at July 6, 2004 06:15 PMwhat about the hedgehog hacienda??
Posted by: beta at July 6, 2004 09:25 PMthe hedgehog hacienda wasn't constructed yet when I took those pictures. I shall rectify that soon. It is a single-level Spanish-style duplex, with separate living and eating quarters, described in the "dip in the pool" post above, I believe.
Posted by: mig at July 7, 2004 07:39 AM