That is definitely not natural marking. Someone has done that to the poor hedgehog. Totally unnecessary to use that much foreign substance on them – even if someone did think it was ok to mark them in the first place. Hedgehogs sense of smell is much better than ours. Even if a human didn’t think that substance smelt, it might do to a hedgehog and consequently interfere with its relationships with other hedgehogs.
To my mind, the idea is to help hedgehogs for their own sake, not simply for humans’ sake. But marking in such a way is also selfish with regard to other humans. That hedgehog very probably visits gardens other than where it was marked, so that those people, who may have learnt to recognise that hedgehog by it’s natural markings, may now be very upset to see it covered in graffiti. If any other animal (and incidentally, hogs do not belong to the person doing the marking) was marked in such a way (such as someone’s cat or dog) most people would be outraged. What is the difference. In many ways marking a hedgehog like that is even worse.
It is possible to learn to recognise hedgehogs by their natural markings and I wrote some tips a while back: https://www.hedgehogstreet.org/forums/topic/identifying-hedgehogs-from-their-natural-markings/
I know it is not you who has marked the hog and what I have written is also for the benefit of other people who read this. If anyone thinks it’s a good idea to mark hedgehogs so they can recognise them more easily – FOR THE HEDGEHOG IT IS NOT!
