Hedgehogs should not become too fat.
Overweight Hedgehogs
Currently, there are a lot of overweight hedgehogs. In Belgium there is even a shelter for too fat hedgehogs, brings RTL News† The guilty? That’s us, humans.
Do not feed hedgehogs
We tend to feed hedgehogs especially when it is cold outside. We think this will help them through the winter and cold spring. But nothing could be further from the truth. When hedgehogs are too heavy, it is dangerous. This makes them easy prey for predators such as birds of prey. Not only because they can then get away less quickly, but also because they can no longer roll up if they are too heavy. That’s the way they protect themselves.
slimming program
The shelter for overweight hedgehogs in Belgium currently has dozens of hedgehogs. Manager Alan Gilson tells RTL News: “People have been feeding them all winter. They have not been able to hibernate and were often in warm places.” He shows a hedgehog that now weighs 1.7 kilos. He should weigh a maximum of 1.2 kilos. That is way too heavy for such a small animal. That is why the hedgehogs in the shelter follow a slimming program. Volunteer Marie Derreumaux explains: “We try to put them outside in the cold, so that they use more energy. In a larger area they can walk around more and hopefully lose some weight.”
stop feeding
When the animals have lost weight enough, they are released back into the wild. The shelter does a good job, but actually the real work is with the people who feed the hedgehogs. The message is therefore: stop doing that. And there are plenty of other ways in which you can help the hedgehog in your garden. This is how you make your garden hedgehog-friendly.
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Source: RTL News