New food

[Jacky]

I have bought some new complete hh food, different from that I have used. Last night hh didn’t seem to eat any of it, it contains dried banana chips, mealworms etc. Is it just cos it’s different? I also put out cat food and sunflower hearts. I have at least two maybe three that visit every night, I’m on holiday for fortnight, my son will be popping by to feed them now and again, hope they don’t miss me too much !

[Wildlifehaven]

Hi Jacky

My visitors are being picky too, I try to give mainly spikes / cat biscuits but some other food as well. At the moment they are turning their noses up completely at any wet cat or dog food. Particularly keen on chopped nuts / sunflower hearts at the moment which I know others will query. I can’t force them to eat a particular thing they eat what they want. In the wild they eat all sorts from worms, Beatles, bugs, frogs, birds, fruit and nuts. This evening I’ve not put any nuts / seeds out to ‘encourage’ them to eat the biscuits instead. With regards to water, they also prefer grubby rainwater to the bowls of freshwater I leave out, they drink mainly from the trays of water to deter the cats in front of the feeding station and have a paddle.

Have a lovely holiday.

[Nic]

Hi Jacky

It may well be because you changed the food that they did not eat it, although dried banana sounds a very strange thing to have in hedgehog food! Sounds like you might be better of sticking to the cat food.

Sorry to say, I don’t expect the hogs will miss you as long as someone puts some food out for them – they are not known for being grateful! I read a while back about some research which was done about that sort of thing and they found that if the hedgehog didn’t find any food in a regular place, they just moved on to find some somewhere else.

Wildlifehaven, they seem to prefer rainwater here too.

[Wildlifehaven]

Hi Nic – can’t say I’d fancy drinking the water I’d washed my feet in but they seem to, mucky little urchins!

[mrob]

Like Jacky, I’ve just bought a huge bag of new hedgehog food (made by Spikes) which contains nuts, mealworms, dried bananas and biscuits and my hogs won’t touch it! I’ve always fed them kitten biscuits, but thought I would get them something more nutritious.

So do I persist with the new food, or go back to the old stuff? Did yours ever get used to the new food, Jacky?

[Nic]

Hi mrob

I am surprised that Spikes are making hog food with dried bananas in it. I always thought they were an ok make, although I don’t use their food myself. I wonder whether these strange ingredients are being put in hedgehog food because of the hedgehogs (non European) which are kept as pets these days(?). I don’t think there is any guarantee that the new food would be any more nutritious than cat/kitten biscuits, so I would go back to cat/kitten biscuits if the hogs like them anyway. Maybe try to use it up – maybe the birds will eat some of it?

At the same time try to improve the habitat in your garden for the hedgehogs. If they can catch their own wild food, it will be better for them than any of these things we are offering to them! Good luck.

[mrob]

Thanks for the reply, Nic. The product’s called Wild Things Hedgehog Food and its definitely made by Spikes, and I’m left with about 4kg on my hands … I’ll try smashing it up a bit for the birds.
I have a camera trained on my hogs feeding station and the gravel path leading up to it, and they love the path – full of beetles, bugs etc, and contrary to what you read, they don’t like to eat slugs!
Back to the kitten biscuits …..

[mrob]

To anyone following this post now and in the future. My hogs are back on kitten biscuits. I claimed a refund for the 2kg unopened bag from the on-line retailer. They didn’t want it returned; they suggested I donate it to my local wildlife centre. I tried to donate it to my nearby Hedgehog Rescue Centre, but they very politely refused my offer on the grounds that a) their hogs didn’t like it and b) in their opinion, it wasn’t nutritious enough for hedgehogs. Evidently, Spikes made this blend because there was a demand for a non-meat hedgehog food that wouldn’t attract rats, cats and dogs. Shame they didn’t make it attractive to hogs!

[Penny]

Hi mrob,

Yes I bought some of the’ Wild Things’ hedgehog food last year and the hogs wouldn’t touch it, even the magpies turned their noses up! I tried mixing it in with their cat biscuits, but they just picked everything else out around it. I can’t believe it is made by Spikes, but then our hogs won’t touch the standard Spikes either, only the semi moist variety. Perhaps it’s time the cat food manufactures started to market hedgehog food, they certainly seem to prefer it!

[Lyjema]

Mine aren’t that keen on the Spikes but if I mix it with mealworms it goes, I have tried other brands but they prefer mealworms, sunflower hearts & peanut granules, I can’t put wet food because the local cats eat it.

[Nic]

Hi Lyjema

Please read the following link on this Forum to find out why it is best to avoid mealworms, sunflower hearts and peanut granules
https://www.hedgehogstreet.org/forums/topic/what-can-i-feed-visiting-wild-hedgehogs-that-is-good-for-them/
It is especially important at this time of year, because there are hoglets about and they can become a bit addicted, in particular, to mealworms and not want to eat anything else. They, of course, are most at risk of metabolic bone disease.
For more about metabolic bone disease see
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZ7Y3a4vgqU
But we warned, you might find the start of the video upsetting.

There are some hedgehog foods, apart from the Spikes one which cats do not like, for instance the Ark Wildlife Hedgehog Mix (mentioned in the above article), or ‘I Love Hedgehogs’, which looks to have similar ingredients. I have been using ‘I Love Hedgehogs’ for many years and most cats ignore it and the hedgehogs happily eat it and seem to be doing well on it. There are a very few mealworms in both of these foods and there is no need to add any more.

Any food we give them, though, should only be supplementary and they need to have plenty of opportunity to find wild food for themselves. Not only time-wise but also access to good habitat.
Please see:
https://www.hedgehogstreet.org/help-hedgehogs/helpful-garden-features/

Good Luck.

[Author]

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