Just like our Raptor Hospital, Suffolk Prickles Hedgehog Rescue have had an incredibly busy season so far, taking in many sick, injured and orphaned Hedgehogs.
Our Hedgehog Hotel was established and funded by Suffolk Owl Sanctuary in order to support Prickles with their regular overspill of recuperating injured hedgehogs. Suffolk Prickles Hedgehog Rescue relies entirely on donations from members of the public and have no other means of funding their work, so where we can assist by taking care of those Hogs that are almost ready for release, we do.
Over the past few weeks, we have only had one guest in our Hotel. Puddles, who has an old leg injury cause by being caught up in netting, has been receiving daily hydrotherapy sessions to improve her fitness and encourage use of all four of her legs again.
Last week, Keeper Jennie received a call from Paula, asking if we had space to take in a few extra guests. Jennie returned with a car full of hedgehogs! Here is a little bit about them all.
Brian
Brian is a single male who was found with a serious head injury, we suspect from being hit by a car. He has spent some time with Paula to make sure that he had made a good recovery. Although he has been doing really well, he still walks with a bit of a lopsided action, making him look a little like he’s headbanging to a famous rock band! Since moving into the Hotel, he’s been exploring his outdoor pen and we hope that he will be ready for release soon.
Alvin, Theodore and Simon
These three Hoglets were found wandering in the daytime, with no sign of mum. We suspect that something must have happened to mum, as they were too young to have been left. Paula cared for these three but it’s now time for these Hoglets to gain some life skills before release. They’ve been placed into one of our pens with plenty of enrichment for them to explore, including a leaf and log pile and tunnels. These will help them gain confidence and learn how to be a Hedgehog by foraging in the vegetation for insects.
Giovanna and her Hoglets Carlos, Nikita and Katya
Giovanna is a blind hedgehog who was brought into Paula while pregnant. Her Hoglets were born at Prickles and have done really well in the indoor pens. With mum being blind, she won’t be released back into the wild proper, but will be given a safe home in a secure garden, where she can spend her evenings foraging without any of the threats that she might face through her disability. Her offspring will be released to a monitored site where they will be supported so that they can slowly gain confidence in their natural abilities to forage and nest.
When they were first arrived and were placed into their pen, one of the youngsters went straight outside for an adventure. After a short while, we were concerned that they couldn’t find their way back inside, so we assisted, and placed mum in the entrance tunnel to the box. Overnight the babies were definitely outside as we found plenty of small poops, but we think Giovanna will take a bit of time to get used to her new surroundings. Hedgehog’s mostly rely on their sense of smell and hearing, so we hope that she will adapt to life with us over time.
All these extra mouths require quite a bit of feeding, so if you would like to contribute, we welcome any donations of meat based loaf dog food or meat based puppy food in jelly, which can be dropped off to our shop between 9-5, 7 days a week. Alternatively, we also have items for the Hedgehogs on our Amazon Wishlist, which you can find here. Any surplus to our requirements we will make available for Prickles to use in their Hospital.