Red Torch Light? Any Good?

[Iamkelliee]

Evening all,
I mod on a Facebook group for wild hedgehog care and it alarms me how much flash photography I see at night along with video with bright phone torches.

I find conflicting information on line but what are everyone’s thoughts on red torch light? Surely it has to be better than bright light? I’m just looking for more information to possibly pass on to group members to hopefully reduce the occurance of bright lights and up close shots damaging hedgehogs eye sight 🙂

[Nic]

Hi lamkelliee

Personally I think you are right to be concerned. Whatever these videos are for, it’s the welfare of the hedgehog that should always come first. Using a bright torch to film hedgehogs sounds to me not only unethical, but also possibly illegal. They are not going to get natural images of a hedgehog in such circumstances.

If they want to film hedgehogs they should be using an infrared camera – as found in camera traps. A red torch light is possibly an improvement on white light, but if a light is shone at a hedgehog it is not going to behave normally. It is more likely to be dazzled by the light. And why are they following the poor hedgehogs around shining torches at them anyway. They should get static camera traps so that the hedgehog has the choice whether to go past it or not. People get some amazing images of hedgehogs from camera traps – and of the hedgehogs behaving in a natural manner.

I think your best bet is to persuade people to get camera traps and to stop stressing the poor hedgehogs by chasing them around with torches.

There is some information about camera traps in this link. The competition has finished, but there is other useful information. https://www.hedgehogstreet.org/hadcompetition/

Good luck

[Nic]

Apologies if you get this twice, but the first version didn’t work, possibly because it had a link as well as was slightly edited.

Hi lamkelliee

Personally I think you are right to be concerned. Whatever these videos are for, it’s the welfare of the hedgehog that should always come first. Using a bright torch to film hedgehogs sounds to me not only unethical, but also possibly illegal. They are not going to get natural images of a hedgehog in such circumstances.

If they want to film hedgehogs they should be using an infrared camera – as found in camera traps. A red torch light is possibly an improvement on white light, but if a light is shone at a hedgehog it is not going to behave normally. It is more likely to be dazzled by the light. And why are they following the poor hedgehogs around shining torches at them anyway. They should get static camera traps so that the hedgehog has the choice whether to go past it or not. People get some amazing images of hedgehogs from camera traps – and of the hedgehogs behaving in a natural manner.

I think your best bet is to persuade people to get camera traps and to stop stressing the poor hedgehogs by chasing them around with torches.

There is some information about camera traps in this link. The competition has finished, but there is other useful information. https://www.hedgehogstreet.org/hadcompetition/

Good luck

[Iamkelliee]

Thank you Nic I really appreciate you taking the time to respond 😊 I personally use a trap camera and have some amazing footage and pictures from it.
It’s just awful to see the amount of people through lockdown use flash photography, albeit they’re excited to have discovered hedgehogs visiting they seem to lose sight of the fact they are nocturnal and white light can be so harsh.
Thank you for the link I will check it out now.

[Nic]

You’re welcome. Hopefully you saw the info. about the Petition for hedgehogs. Maybe you can pass the information on to your Facebook Group and all your friends, relatives, etc.

https://www.hedgehogstreet.org/petition-to-increase-hedgehog-protection/

[Author]

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