Wednesday 17 December 2008

Hedgehog Diary December 17th, 2008

Well today Tiggy had his bedding changed. Now that my flu is easing off and I am getting some of my senses back, I am noticing how smelly hedgehogs can be. And they definitely don't mind at all where they happen to go to the bathroom either. In the water dish, in the food dish... in his bed on the cardboard tube in the straw and on the papers.... Maybe this is why he only weighed in at 430 grams today. I must have weighed him yesterday after he had a heavy meal. Well I also find that Hedgehog pooh isn't very nice to get on your hands either. ICK...So we now have gloves.
Something else I learnt today about Hedge Hogs is that they do a huffy puffy thing. I think it is something that they do when they are grumpy and want to be left alone. I have a feeling little Tiggy is definitely coming out of hibernation now and is most annoyed with me. He also didn't seem to eat as much yesterday as he did the day before.
Another thing I read about today on Hedge Hogs was about their Quills. Apparently they can loose them like we humans loose hairs from our head. And sometimes they can be a bit of an irritant when poked into your skin. Well when the Hedge hog poohs everywhere and then rolls in it then pokes you with it then you can get a nasty infection. So one needs to make sure and wash your hands after handling Hedgehogs. I also now have some leather garden gloves because I also learnt and luckily not the hard way that Hedge hogs can sometimes bite.
So although they are cute and lovely little creatures, they are still very much wild animals and as so should be treated as such with care and caution.

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