Hedgehog unable to swim?

[NathanA]

Hi all. I’m after some advice. I’ve built a pond in my garden as well as digging holes under the nearby fences. I’m proud to say I have two hedgehogs visiting now.

The bad news is, on Saturday night a hedgehog fell in my pond and appeared to be drowning. Luckily I was watching so managed to rescue it. Thing is, the pond doesn’t have steep sides, in fact I completely lowered once side of the pond just in case this happened.

Last night, same again. It fell in and rather than swimming, was spinning round and round trying to keep it’s head above the water. Rather than moving near the sides it just thrashed about in the middle. I went to rescue it and it stopped moving (maybe because I was there), lifted it out, waited a minute and then it walked away.

I’ve looked at videos of hedgehogs swimming with ease and have built many ponds and not had this problem. Do I have a non-swimming hedgehog, could it be blind so didn’t expect it or would it have been okay and I was too concerned?

[stef]

Hedgehogs can swim. it is possible that it’s blind and therefore shocked.
Can you put some kind of ramp to the middle of the pond?

[NathanA]

I’ll try that but it seemed unable to grab hold of anything and was whirling about in the water. I’ve dropped the sides even more and put a small mounded barrier around the edge just in case it is blind and follows natural “runs”. I’ll watch it tonight.

Very odd behaviour.

[Author]

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