Table Manners
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Why oh why do we spend ages preparing a delightful feast of yumminess for our evening visitors to begin eating with good manners then to suddenly decide to stand or sit in it to eat! All the hedgehogs who visit our feeding station seem to like this way of eating.
Hi Helen
Try using smaller bowls for food, then they might not stand in them so much – that is until hoglets come along, when it seems a favourite occupation. Also stops the adults getting a look in if the hoglets stand in the bowls because they fill them – very clever.
I have a couple of small terracotta ones which work well as have some weight to them though can still be pushed around, usually once emptied. Been using some small plastic ones too as more mouths to feed (2 males and 1 female) but they are slightly larger and lighter and the hogs seem to up end them so seem to work better for water than food.
Hi char2020
Yes, they will up end the lighter dishes – they quite often rest their feet on the rims. Feel a bit sorry for the poor hog when it happens, but it does look quite funny when they send the food flying into their face! But yes, small terracotta bowls are better. Although they will sometimes tip those over to see what’s underneath – quite natural if you think that turning over a stone might produce some interesting morsel of food.
But for water the wider the better (as long as it’s still shallow). Hogs’ motto seems to be ‘why walk round a water bowl when you can walk through it’, so if they are too small they often get tipped over.
We have tried different types of bowls but they just seem to like standing it it, it is very funny to watch.
I can always tell which water bowls the hogs have been to, as there is always a little pile of mud where their feet have been. I agree with you both Nic and Helen, they do seem to just like standing in it. I’ve never seem them lick their feet in order to clean them (like you see other animals do) so perhaps its a ‘dip n sip’ approach to water bowls.
I use six inch flowerpot saucers for both their food and water. They are very shallow and hard for them to tip up.
To keep it stable in their feeding station, I’va a little block of wood with a large hook in it and there’s a small hole in the rim of their dinner saucer, to which I attach it. The block of wood is outside the plastic feeding station, so they can’t tip the bowl up or move it.
As I use the lid of the box as a floor for the feeding station, it’s quite obvious that sometimes when what’s going in today at one end, yesterday’s is coming out the other end at the same time!
It’s also obvious that to get at the food on the far side of the dish, it’s quite happy to stand in the water saucer.As it’s very hot, I’ve left a 12″ pot saucer full of water near their home as a paddling pool
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