Woodlands – And so it begins

Woodlands Animal Sanctuary have welcomed their first litter of hoglets for this season. A litter of three hoglets, whose nest had been disturbed, were brought into the sanctuary on Tuesday evening and the Woodlands team have now taken over the hand rearing of these babies. This means that they will be fed every 2 hrs day & night! Never work with animals and children – baby animals can be the same!

Mum was also found and she was very poorly, but again she has been admitted to Woodlands who will do everything they can to treat and rehabilitate her, so that she can be released back into the wild when she is well enough. However, even when mum is back to full health, she will not be reunited with her babies unfortunately, because hedgehogs are not always the best parents. If their nest is disturbed, or a mummy hog feels she and her babies are threatened – the best course of action we can hope she takes is to abandon her babies and hope they are old enough to survive on their own. But often, her course of action is sadly to eat her young! A totally unbelievable trait for us, but a very common one for hogs none the less.

Therefore, if you ever find a hedgehog nest, or think you have, Woodlands urge you to stay away! As curious as you may be, even if mum is not there at the time, as she may be out getting food, she will know that you have been near and that puts the hoglets in mortal danger.

If you think you know where there is a nest and you suspect that mum has already abandoned her babies, or that she has may not be coming back, for whatever reason, then you will hear the babies calling for her, and moving around in an unsettled manner. It is ONLY in this case, that you should intercept and step in to help the babies by taking them to a reputable hedgehog rescue.

Woodlands are very pleased to welcome this first little of hoglets because it means that breeding season for hedgehogs has started and therefore the species is moving forwards once more. Not to mention, that although they are a lot of work and very time consuming, hoglets are incredibly cute!