Encouraging Hedgehogs to your Garden: Factsheet
Create a wild area
Piles of logs and leafs encourage insects and invertebrates that hedgehogs eat. They also provide a secure site for breeding and hibernating. The bigger the area the better.
Create a wildflower patch
Plant a diverse semi natural wildflower patch, using native seed mixes where possible, to suit your soil type. Go for mixes without grass seed and add no fertilizers. Growing wild flowers will encourage biodiversity and attract a valuable hedgehog food source to your garden.
Make a hedgehog artificial home
This can be as simple as putting a board against a wall or purchasing a purpose built one.
Feeding hedgehogs
Providing fresh food and water will encourage hedgehogs to your garden. Tinned dog or cat food (not gravy or fish varieties), cat biscuits and chopped egg are advisable. You can buy specialist hedgehog food from specialist suppliers (garden centres or online). Cows milk isn’t advisable as it upsets hedgehogs’ stomachs.
Open air compost heaps
Compost heaps make an attractive nesting site for hedgehogs and are a good food source, due to the creepy crawlies that live in them. Be careful when turning your heap with a garden fork.
Ponds
Hedgehogs will benefit from having an all year round water supply and thrive on the insects and amphibians that ponds attract. Hedgehogs are excellent swimmers. Ensure that ponds have sloping edges to make it easy for hedgehogs to climb out. Stones or chicken wire can also be used to assist hedgehogs with easy exit. If a pond has steep sides and no adaptations are able to be made it will be a hazard to many animals, so will need to be covered or fenced off to ensure that animals don’t get trapped in it and drown.
DIY hedgehog highways
One of the reasons why hedgehogs are declining in Britain is because our garden fences and walls are becoming more secure thereby reducing the amount of land available to them. Making a 13cm by 13cm hole in your garden fence or wall is sufficient to allow a hedgehog to pass through, but will be too small for most pets to pass through.
You can register your hole on the “BIG HEDGEHOG MAP” and snazzy hedgehog street signs are available to purchase from the British Hedgehog Preservation Society Shop for £3, which you can put above your hedgehog hole.
You can encourage your neighbours to create holes in their fences and walls, to expand the habitat area for hedgehogs in your area. Become a hedgehog champion and educate your local community about hedgehogs and their conservation and preservation. See this website.
Use natural alternatives to slug pellets
Slug pellets are hazardous to hedgehogs and they have been found dead with high levels of slug pellets active ingredients in their system. Slug pellets may not always kill hedgehogs but may effect their reproductive ability and have a negative effect on their population.
Some alternatives to slug pellets are:
Garden Hazards
Strimmers: Check through long grass before starting to strim an overgrown area.
Swimming pools and ponds: Ensure that they are securely covered, or have an exit ramp or sloping sides or stones so hedgehogs can climb out. Check ponds and swimming pools daily.
Bonfires: Check wood or brash piles for nesting hedgehogs before burning.
Netting: Hedgehogs can easily get caught up in netting. Nets act like a snare and can cause severe injuries and death. Make sure all unused netting is lifted off the ground and pea netting is high enough for hedgehogs to pass under.
Chemicals: Slug pellets, herbicides, wood preservers, bleach and disinfectants are examples of chemical hazards for hedgehogs. Choose environmentally friendly wood preservers. Be mindful of the effects that chemicals can have on wildlife in your garden and seek natural and environmentally friendly products as an alternative. Herbicides can decrease earthworm and invertebrate populations, which in turn can diminish hedgehogs’ food supply.
Piles of logs and leafs encourage insects and invertebrates that hedgehogs eat. They also provide a secure site for breeding and hibernating. The bigger the area the better.
Create a wildflower patch
Plant a diverse semi natural wildflower patch, using native seed mixes where possible, to suit your soil type. Go for mixes without grass seed and add no fertilizers. Growing wild flowers will encourage biodiversity and attract a valuable hedgehog food source to your garden.
Make a hedgehog artificial home
This can be as simple as putting a board against a wall or purchasing a purpose built one.
Feeding hedgehogs
Providing fresh food and water will encourage hedgehogs to your garden. Tinned dog or cat food (not gravy or fish varieties), cat biscuits and chopped egg are advisable. You can buy specialist hedgehog food from specialist suppliers (garden centres or online). Cows milk isn’t advisable as it upsets hedgehogs’ stomachs.
Open air compost heaps
Compost heaps make an attractive nesting site for hedgehogs and are a good food source, due to the creepy crawlies that live in them. Be careful when turning your heap with a garden fork.
Ponds
Hedgehogs will benefit from having an all year round water supply and thrive on the insects and amphibians that ponds attract. Hedgehogs are excellent swimmers. Ensure that ponds have sloping edges to make it easy for hedgehogs to climb out. Stones or chicken wire can also be used to assist hedgehogs with easy exit. If a pond has steep sides and no adaptations are able to be made it will be a hazard to many animals, so will need to be covered or fenced off to ensure that animals don’t get trapped in it and drown.
DIY hedgehog highways
One of the reasons why hedgehogs are declining in Britain is because our garden fences and walls are becoming more secure thereby reducing the amount of land available to them. Making a 13cm by 13cm hole in your garden fence or wall is sufficient to allow a hedgehog to pass through, but will be too small for most pets to pass through.
You can register your hole on the “BIG HEDGEHOG MAP” and snazzy hedgehog street signs are available to purchase from the British Hedgehog Preservation Society Shop for £3, which you can put above your hedgehog hole.
You can encourage your neighbours to create holes in their fences and walls, to expand the habitat area for hedgehogs in your area. Become a hedgehog champion and educate your local community about hedgehogs and their conservation and preservation. See this website.
Use natural alternatives to slug pellets
Slug pellets are hazardous to hedgehogs and they have been found dead with high levels of slug pellets active ingredients in their system. Slug pellets may not always kill hedgehogs but may effect their reproductive ability and have a negative effect on their population.
Some alternatives to slug pellets are:
- encouraging amphibians to your garden via a pond (as they will eat slugs and snails)
- hand pick slugs and snails from your garden
- use dried seaweed in large quantities around plants
- water your garden in the morning rather than the evening, as slugs thrive in the damp.
Garden Hazards
Strimmers: Check through long grass before starting to strim an overgrown area.
Swimming pools and ponds: Ensure that they are securely covered, or have an exit ramp or sloping sides or stones so hedgehogs can climb out. Check ponds and swimming pools daily.
Bonfires: Check wood or brash piles for nesting hedgehogs before burning.
Netting: Hedgehogs can easily get caught up in netting. Nets act like a snare and can cause severe injuries and death. Make sure all unused netting is lifted off the ground and pea netting is high enough for hedgehogs to pass under.
Chemicals: Slug pellets, herbicides, wood preservers, bleach and disinfectants are examples of chemical hazards for hedgehogs. Choose environmentally friendly wood preservers. Be mindful of the effects that chemicals can have on wildlife in your garden and seek natural and environmentally friendly products as an alternative. Herbicides can decrease earthworm and invertebrate populations, which in turn can diminish hedgehogs’ food supply.