Hi 5sandown
It’s understandable if it’s for that reason i.e. for the benefit of the hedgehog or hedgehogs in general. The guidance of the BHPS is that they are sure hedgehogs would rather not be marked but if someone has to mark them it should be with non-toxic water based substance on only a very few spines, away from the face, etc. Even when it is for the benefit of the hog/s, in reality, there is no need for more than one dot in most instances. i.e. left shoulder, right shoulder, right hip, left hip, etc.
But these hogs are atrociously marked with large areas of markings. Some pale some dark, so possibly being marked by different people, but with really excessive amounts of substance, so that the poor things look like parodies of their natural selves. So sad to see, and the people doing that may well claim to be hedgehog lovers! To my mind to mark hedgehogs in such a way is not only completely unnecessary, definitely not for the hedgehogs benefit and in some cases even cruelty.
If people are doing it to see how many hedgehogs they have visiting, these hedgehogs are often re-marked with different patterns, so potentially are being counted more than once. And who does that benefit, the person not the hedgehog.
All very sad – as if the hogs didn’t have enough to contend with without that!
