Thursday 25 March 2010

An early visitor

This photo was taken just after 7:00pm tonight. The sky wasn't even fully dark. I'd just gone out to put food out for the hedgehogs and to refresh the newspaper in the feeding station and was about to lift the lid when I saw that there was a hedgehog already in residence eating the scraps from the previous night.

That's about two and half hours earlier than visits have been recently, and some nights they don't even put in an appearance until 11:30-ish or even after midnight. I'm wondering if this is a different hedgehog from the usual two visitors. It certainly isn't Blondie - I can see that from the lack of markings, but I have to confess that I don't know if the hedgehog I refer to as "the other one" is actually a single hedgehog or several.

Alternatively perhaps this hedgehog is "the other one" (or one of "the other ones") who has already been visiting and was woken by the thunderstorm we had an hour earlier and then emerged when the rain stopped; it might have thought it wise to venture out while it could.

However, this is all just conjecture. I'm hoping to capture some evidence on camera of there actually being more than two hedgehogs currently visiting the garden.

3 comments:

  1. We all have 'the other one'....mine is called 'Baby'
    I am quite jealous of all your hog activity Gavin....the food I'm putting out is going but I have yet to see a hedgehog.
    Isn't it great that these hedgehogs have survived the terribly cold snowy winter?

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  2. There were a couple of hogs out shortly after 9:00pm. The smaller one (Blondie, I think) kept bashing into the larger one ("the other one").

    Hopefully the camera will have caught some footage - I have it set to video mode tonight.

    I think hedgehogs are hardier than we give them credit for. They've survived all sorts of hideous climate conditions.

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  3. The only way to know for sure is to catch them and mark them (water-based tippex on the bum is usually best).

    We have had a hoggie (Uno) here since the beginning of this month. Moved into the house we put into the garden for out two rescues last Autumn (they seem to have deserted us). Last Sunday another hoggie appeared, and took up residence in the house. Have some great footage of Uno trying desparately to remove the squatter. Failed, but the squatter later left and Uno has since retuned to us.

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