GRASSCUTTING EQUIPMENT WARNING STICKERS

[MOIRA GRANT]

I was interested to see that BHPS was working with football clubs ( by sending them warning stickers & involving them in publicity) raising awareness of the dangers which their ground maintenance equipment poses to resting hedgehogs. After seeing a particularly horrible photo of a hog with the tip of its little snout cut off, I contacted Celia Gibb of BHPS, who sends out the stickers. With her agreement, I contacted all the rugby clubs I could find here in Scotland (had no idea there were so many!) Quite a few agreed to take the stickers & I gave Celia their contact details. I’m thinking about doing the same with Golf Clubs. Here’s the sort of wording I used for the rugby & I emailed it to all the Clubs with email addresses.

“Hello, I’m a Hedgehog Champion with the British Hedgehog Preservation Society, which is a registered charity, but this is not a request for money! .One of our problems is that hedgehogs often sleep in long grass and as a result many have suffered terrible injuries or death when grass-cutters/strimmers inadvertently hit them. The species is in serious decline, with over a third of hedgehogs lost since 2000, so any measures to protect them from such a horrible fate are valuable.

The BHPS has for some time been teaming up with football clubs who agree to placing “Check for hedgehogs” warning labels on their grounds maintenance equipment. The labels are free & the BHPS would love to run a similar awareness raising campaign with the your Rugby Club. I attach a link which shows the labels used in the football club campaign, with photos of them in action.

I do hope that you will come on board. It would be great environmental publicity for your Club and Rugby in general. You might even get some new players or fans as a result! If you would like warning labels, please email me directly with a contact name & address & a note of the number required. I’ll then pass this on to BHPS who will post them out to you free of charge.

Thanks and best wishes for a successful season”

If one of my fellow Champions in England is thinking about doing something similar then I’d suggest contacting Celia Gibb at BHPS first as it would be best if only one person carries it out, to avoid the clubs getting lots of emails from enthusiastic champions! Good luck if you go ahead, anything to stop these poor wee creatures suffering terrible injuries and deaths

[Nic]

That sounds a brilliant idea, Moira. You might also be interested in this from Willows Hedgehog Rescue https://www.willowshedgehogrescue.co.uk/working-together-raising-strimmer-awareness.html

p.s. I’m answering this in parts. the Forum doesn’t seem to like too many links at the moment.

[Nic]

Sadly many hedgehogs are also injured or killed by garden machinery in people’s gardens. This is the time of year when many people ‘tidy up’ their gardens and consequently use strimmers and other garden machinery. A Good time to put up posters reminding everyone of the dangers to hogs. Here are links to a couple of posters:

https://www.britishhedgehogs.org.uk/posters/dangers.pdf

[Nic]

Another poster link:

https://chascreek.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451ded069e201b8d1046a8c970c-popup

[MOIRA GRANT]

thanks, the posters are great, will print & see where I can put them up. Delighted to see that manufacturers are getting involved too. I think every electrical garden cutter should have a warning on it, this is on the right track. I did persuade Falkirk council to take stickers for its own equipment…so much is about educating the operatives, which you are doing. Long live hedgehogs!

[Nic]

Hi Moira

Totally agree that all garden cutting machines should have a warning on them to look out for hogs. Well done re. Falkirk Council. Keep up the good work!

Yes. Long live hedgehogs!

[Nic]

That sounds a brilliant idea, Moira. You might also be interested in this from Willows Hedgehog Rescue https://www.willowshedgehogrescue.co.uk/working-together-raising-strimmer-awareness.html

Sadly many hedgehogs are also injured or killed by garden machinery in people’s gardens. This is the time of year when many people ‘tidy up’ their gardens and consequently use strimmers and other garden machinery. A Good time to put up posters reminding everyone of the dangers to hogs. Here are links to a couple of posters:

https://www.britishhedgehogs.org.uk/posters/dangers.pdf
https://chascreek.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451ded069e201b8d1046a8c970c-popup

[MOIRA GRANT]

thanks again, pretty disgusting that some of these big manufacturers wouldn’t come on board, full credit to those who have. Useful info, i might see if I can get it circulated somehow through COSLA which covers Scottish local authorities

[Nic]

Hi Moira

Sorry that all got repeated again. Someone is trying to sort out the gremlins on the Forum and obviously noticed that my initial version of the post didn’t make it there and so remedied that. Meanwhile I had already put it on again in parts, so that it appeared immediately. Hope that makes sense!

You’re doing a great job. I think that it probably doesn’t even cross some people’s minds that there may be an animal hiding in the grass/vegetation they are about to strim. Although, sadly there will always be some who can’t be bothered to check first and who just don’t care, making the ones who do care but just don’t realise, has got to save some lives.

[Author]

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