Hedgehogs at Home Education Learning Place

Making a hedgehog family

Claire and Ann had a great day at Home Education Learning Place with the home school community in Easton, delivering a hedgehog talk.  What a brilliant place with great outdoor playing equipment and a lovely learning hall... with a kitchen full of chocolate brownies!!!!

Anyway, back to the hedgehogs! The group of about 30 children- of a range of ages- were told all about the plight of the hedgehog. Hedgehogs have declined by a quarter over the last 10 years. Claire detailed why the hedgehogs are in trouble, what makes them such fascinating creatures and what we can all do to help.

Getting stuck in to making cly hedgehogs

Everyone got stuck in making clay hedgehogs- there were many excellent hedgehogs- even hedgehog families were being made. The class paid careful attention to the hedgehog, its long nose used for sniffing out worms, its claws used for digging them up, its little teeth (we’ve seen a hedgehog gobble up worms in the Avon Wildlife Trust office!) its small tail, long back legs and 6000 spikes, a useful defence mechanism!

There were also super Hedgehog names for their creations, including Hedgeward, Hedge, Snuffles, Tricky, Spike and Hugo. Ann then told a story all about the perils of being a hedgehog called ‘ The Adventures of Spike the Hedgehog’ to which the group provided sound effects.

The Adventures of Spike the Hedgehog

Our visit has even raised money for the Avon Wildlife Trust. So thank you to everyone who made a donation!

If you would like information on how to make your garden hedgehog friendly then please visit our wild hedgehogs site click here.

Also, be sure to record any hedgehog sightings in our on line survey too! Click here.

Wildlife makes the most of the mild weather

The short days and long cold nights of Winter usually make this a time for wildlife to step down a gear but it seems the recent spell of mild weather has caused Spring to have sprung a little early this year.

Many plants which usually flower between late January to early February such as Lesser Celandine and Cowslips have been seen in bloom in our local Leigh Woods whereas Snowdrops, Crocuses and Daffodils have been seen elsewhere around the country. The mild weather seems to have made these plants think winter's over, making them bloom well ahead of schedule. The buds on trees such as Silver Birch and Oak are already bursting and Hazel Catkins have even been seen in some areas.

Daffodils (Photo: Hazel Philips)

Lesser Celandine
(Photo: Shirley Freeman)

Snowdrops (Photo: Anna Guthrie)


Although the vibrant trumpets of daffodils might be a welcome sight to brighten up our grey winter, it's not all good news. Winter is not over and there is still a risk of colder days to come. The wildlife can suffer if a late cold spell comes along, so lets hope for a mild February!

Photo: Richard Burkmar

This untimely mild weather can also be dangerous for small mammals. Sightings of hedgehogs out and about around indicate these as well as other small mammals may have woken early from hibernation, expecting the abundance of food that Spring provides. With not much food around for them to forage in these winter months, many of them could starve. If you see a hedgehog then it's great to give them a helping hand by leaving out some food - dog food and cat food would be happily gobbled up. Visit our Wild Hedgehogs site for more info.

Native plants and trees are a great indicator of wider changes in the environment. Early sightings of plants such as daffodils and snowdrops could be an indicator of  climate change. Take a look at The Woodland Trust's Nature's Calendar which documents unusual seasonal events spotted by the general public, as a way of demonstrating how climate change could be affecting our wildlife.

Let us know what unusual wildlife you've spotted lately!



Make your own hedgehog!

After all the fun we've had making clay hedgehogs with children at South Gloucestershire primary schools in the last few weeks, we thought we'd share with our fellow readers how you can make one yourself! As well as having fun being creative, it's a great opportunity to learn some facts about our little spikey friends who are becoming endangered.

What you will need

• Clay (air drying is the best)
• Cocktail sticks snapped in half
• Googley eyes (can be found in craft shops) or small stones also look great

How to make your clay hedgehog

1. Get yourself a ball of clay, about the size of a satsuma.
2. Roll the clay into a smooth ball.
3. Squidge out some of the clay to make a nose. If you like you can prick little holes in the end of the nose for nostrils!
4. If you're feeling particularly creative, you can give your hog some teeth or maybe even give it some feet with claws.
5. When you're happy with the shape of your hedgehog you can put the eyes in place and give it spikes with lots of little cocktail sticks.
6. Leave your hedgehog to air-dry overnight

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Hedgehog facts

• Hedgehogs have between 6000-7000 spikes.
• Their eyesight is quite poor and so they depend on their strong sense of smell and hearing to find food and stay clear of predators.
• Hedgehogs roll into a ball and point their spikes in all different directions to protect themselves against predators such as badgers and foxes.
• Hedgehogs love eating slugs, snails, beatles caterpillars and worms.
• A third of urban hedgehogs have disappeared in the last 20 years.

For more info on why hedgehogs numbers are on the decline and what you can do to help them, visit our Wild Hedgehogs website here. We're running a survey to help us get a clear picture of where hedgehogs are doing well and not so well, so if you see a hedgehog (dead or alive) then map your sighting here.

It's a Hog's Life

Ann and Claire had a great afternoon delivering an  'It's a  Hog's Life'  workshop to 90 children at Staple Hill Primary School yesterday! 

There was much excitement as we arrived and the children quickly realised that we had some hedgehog-themed fun in store! The biggest clue was Claire was dressed up as a hedgehog!

 The children learnt all about one of Britain's favourite mammals, what makes them such fascinating creatures and why hedgehogs are in trouble and need our help! Recent reports show that hedgehogs have decline by a quarter over the last 10 years.

You can find out more at http://www.wildhedgehogs.org.uk/

or see some video footage of these special creatures at

http://www.hedgehogstreet.org/pages/your-hedgehog-videos.html

The pupils made some brilliant hedgehog creations out of clay and sticks, and had really thought about the long nose of the hedgehog and their many spikes! There were also some very interesting names too, including Spike, Spikes, Spiky, Brambleberry, Rose and Roger!

The children then provided excellent sound effects to 'The Adventures of Spike the Hedgehog' a story all about the perils of hedgehog life! The children were very inquisitive and had many hedgehog questions to ask us- but at the end of the day Claire and Ann decided to ask the questions and were very pleased at how much the pupils had learnt about our spiky friends! 

Thank you to staff and pupils at Staple Hill Primary School for such a fun afternoon!

Hedgehogs still need help!

You may have seen Annie from the Help a Hedgehog hospital on Autumnwatch Unsprung last week. She talked about the importance of keeping your eyes open for the autumn orphans that are around at the moment.

photo: Gillian Day

Sadly these beautiful mammals have declined by 30% since the 1990's, mainly due to road casualties and loss of habitat, but increasingly, many young hoglets do not survive their winter hibernation due to a lack of fat reserves. Young hoglets need to reach 500g - 600g in weight in order to make it through the cold winter months so we need to do our bit by putting out fresh water and meat based pet food in this important time.If you do find a young hedgehog that you are concerned about, contact the Hedgehog Preservation society or a local group which you should be able to find online.

Some of you might be wondering about 'Sonny' that I mentioned in a previous blog. He was a tiny, hungry but very friendly autumn baby that I found in my own back garden.Thankfully, thanks to the great work that Annie and her team do, Sonny is making good progress and I hope to have him, and a friend, home soon to overwinter in a hutch in my shed. He still is less than 400g in weight and is therefore unlikely to survive the winter if he was released now so I am looking forward to giving him and his friend some TLC, along with some tasty mealworms, dried cat food and fresh water.

In the Spring they will be released into my garden so they can rummage around in the long grass, enjoy lots of tasty snacks from the piles of dead wood and compost heaps then sneak through the hole in the fence to my neighbours garden to explore the world beyond.

If you think you might have some hedgehogs around where you live, look out for footprints in the mud. Notice, the different shapes of the front and back feet and the distinctive tracks. You may also find hedgehog 'poo' on your lawn. This is very dark, almost black and you can sometimes see beetle wing cases within it.                                         For more information about hedgehogs and how you can help see our Wild hedgehogs website or become a hedgehog champion at Hedgehog Street -  a great project from the British Hedgehog Preservation Society and the People's Trust for Endangered Species.

I'd like to say thanks, in particular, to Carole at Help a Hedgehog for the care and attention she has given Sonny to restore his health and of course, to all those who care for hedgehogs around the country.

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Victoria Park Primary School go Hedgehog-tastic!

 

Photo: Gillian Day

 A reception class from Victoria Park Primary School decided to choose The Avon Wildlife Trust as their charity for their school charity week. Feeling pretty happy about this, we decided to go in to the school and give them a morning full of hedgehog fun!

The children learnt all about how hedgehogs find their food by playing our hedgehog game - using their sense of smell to sniff out any slugs they wanted to eat and curling up into a ball if they smelt a badger!

Have a listen to the fantstic hedgehoggy facts the children learnt here.

  

We also got our hands dirty making clay hedgehogs with the group. Have a look at some of their creations below.

 

We rounded off the day with Ann's very own story, 'The Adventures of Spike The Hedgehog' whilst I acted out Spike's adventure in the Avon Wildlife Trust's very own hedgehog costume!

What a brilliant morning and great group of children. Thanks to the Yellow Class at Victoria Park School for choosing to support us!