Encouraging Hedgehogs into Your Garden This Spring

Why Spring Is a Critical Time for Hedgehogs

Hedgehogs start to emerge from hibernation around late March and into April, and the first few weeks after waking are some of the hardest of their year. A hedgehog that went to sleep in autumn in good condition may have lost a quarter or more of its body weight by the time it appears in your garden, and it now has to rebuild that condition quickly before the breeding season begins.

Hedgehogs are also great wanderers. One animal may travel a mile or more in a single night, moving through a dozen or more gardens in search of beetles, caterpillars, earthworms and slugs. That means your garden does not have to be perfect in itself to be genuinely useful, it only has to be connected to others, and safe to cross. Gardens are now one of the most important habitats hedgehogs have left in Britain, so the small decisions you make this spring carry real weight.

Open Up Your Boundaries

The single most valuable thing you can do is to stop your garden being a sealed island. Hedgehogs cannot climb or dig under a solid barrier, and a tidy run of close-boarded fencing around a whole plot effectively shuts them out.

The fix is beautifully simple. Cut or leave a 13cm square gap at ground level in the bottom of each boundary, roughly the size of a CD case. That is large enough for a hedgehog to pass through comfortably and too small for most dogs and cats to follow. One gap per side of the garden is plenty, and if you can persuade a neighbour to do the same, you create what is often called a hedgehog highway, linking gardens into a genuine network.

• Cut gaps in fence panels, at the base of gates, and through low walls where practical.
• Line the gap with a short length of pipe or a few bricks to stop it filling with soil and debris.
• Keep the gap clear of long grass, leaf litter and new growth through the season.
• If you rent or share the boundary, mention it, most people are happy to help once they know why.

Water, Food, and What to Avoid

A shallow dish of fresh water is one of the kindest things you can put out. Hedgehogs get thirsty, particularly in dry spells, and they cannot reach the water in a steep-sided bird bath or a pond with sheer edges. Use a saucer or a shallow bowl with a lip no more than 2cm high, and refresh it daily.

If you want to feed, meat-based cat food in jelly is the reliable choice, along with dry cat biscuits or a purpose-made hedgehog food. Fish-based foods are best avoided, as is anything in gravy, which is too salty. Never put out bread and milk, once the traditional offering, but now known to cause serious digestive problems in hedgehogs.

And please do not use slug pellets. They are lethal to hedgehogs, either eaten directly or taken in through poisoned slugs and snails, and they work against you in the long run by removing the very food a hedgehog is looking for. The same applies to most garden insecticides and weedkillers. A garden with a healthy hedgehog population will have its slugs kept in check naturally.

Build a Wild Corner

Hedgehogs need somewhere to sleep during the day and somewhere to nest, and a scrupulously tidy garden offers neither. A quiet corner left slightly unkempt will do more than any bought accessory.

A log pile is ideal. Stack a few untreated logs and branches loosely in a shaded spot, add some dry leaves around the base, and leave it undisturbed. The decaying wood attracts beetles and grubs, which is exactly what a hedgehog wants to eat, and the gaps make a comfortable daytime resting place. A leaf pile, a compost heap with a hedgehog-sized opening, or a patch of long grass left to grow will all serve.

If you would like something more deliberate, a hedgehog house does work well when sited properly. Choose one with a short entrance tunnel, place it in a quiet, dry corner facing away from the prevailing wind and away from full afternoon sun, and fill it loosely with dry leaves. Then leave it alone. Disturbing a nest, particularly between May and September when hoglets may be present, does far more harm than good.

Check Before You Cut and Clear

Spring gardening brings its own hazards, and most of them are avoidable with a moment's thought.

• Strimmers and mowers. Walk the long grass first and look before you cut, hedgehogs rest in exactly the places a strimmer reaches first.
• Netting. Pea netting, fruit netting and sports netting all tangle hedgehogs badly. Lift netting at least 30cm off the ground, or put it away when not in use.
• Ponds. Add a gently sloping ramp or a pile of stones at one edge so anything that falls in can climb out.
• Drains and light wells. Cover open ones with a mesh grid, they are silent traps.
• Bonfires and rubbish piles. Check thoroughly and move material before lighting, ideally on the same day.

None of this requires a wild, unmanaged garden. It requires a garden with a gap in the fence, a dish of water, a scruffy corner and a little care with the strimmer. Do those things this spring and you give a passing hedgehog exactly what it needs to recover, feed and, with luck, raise a family under your hedge.