Why Is Hedgehog's Body Vibrating As He Enters Nest?
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We thought we only had one hedgehog resident in our garden but now it appears we have two in different nests. However if you look at this video the hedgehog seems to be making a noise (his body vibrates). Is he checking that no one else is in the nest? Maybe the two hogs were sharing at one point?
Hi MrsHogofthehedge
Nice to see you have hogs around. It looks to me as if you might be right and the hog is having a good sniff and it is his lungs expanding. It looks exaggerated because of all those spines! Also he looks fairly small, but sometimes video is deceptive. However, hogs do sometimes get breathing problems – possibly from worms, so if he is making a lot of noise when breathing, (I don’t mean the noise they make during courtship) and you are concerned, it might be worth taking the advice of your local carer. If you don’t already have contact details you can get details of your nearest carer from the BHPS.01584 89080.
It isn’t certain that there is more than one hog, even if there are two nests. They sometimes change nests during hibernation. I had a little chap here all winter. He spent ages building a nest in one of the boxes but mostly only used it for naps between snacks and must have had another nest somewhere else.
Hope the hog or hogs are ok and stay well.
Hi Nic,
We definitely have two hedgehogs because hubby accidentally uncovered one hibernating. He thought one of the hedgehog nests had been vacated because we saw another coming out of the hedgehog house via our wildlife camera. So he thought he’d give one of the hedgehog nests a change of bedding but he put all bedding back carefully when he discovered sleeping hog. Plus one hog is bigger than the other. They have different personalities. The bigger one is calmer whereas the smaller one is rather skittish. We have never seen them both together; but that might be because one is hibernating and one just sleeps during the day. The bigger one only hibernated from early January to early February but is now having another stint of hibernation.
It might be just as well that they are not both active as I may have to put two feeding stations out instead of one.
Don’t think either of them have health problems. Never seen out during the day and both eat well from the feeding station (when out of hibernation).
Another strange thing they both do is use one place to do their business (side alley) near house as if they want to keep front garden and back garden droppings free! House trained hedgehogs without even trying!
Hi MrsHogoftheHedge
Sounds like you have pretty definitive proof of 2 hogs then! It is interesting how you can sometimes detect quite different characters in the hogs. Just a tip for ‘hubby’, though, re. hog nests, it is best to leave them until April: https://www.hedgehogstreet.org/cleaning-out-boxes/
Even if you don’t think one is empty, there may be times when they still use them. Like the one here. Having seen the little chap here spending hours taking material into his box, I know it takes a huge amount of work for them to build one. The males usually start coming out of hibernation any time now, but the females often not until a month’s time or more.Glad to hear the hogs there seem well. I wouldn’t worry too much about feeding stations, they will probably sort it out, otherwise you could end up with a whole row of them! I usually feed the hogs here in the open during the summer – makes it easier to watch them.
Interesting that you have house, or garden, trained hogs! The one here seems to have been very clean and tidy and I have seldom seen any poos from him at all – until recently. Last night there were two in the feeding box. Don’t want him starting to get into those sort of habits!
Hi Nic, Yes, we definitely have two hedgehogs as we caught them having a punch up on camera. I think the smaller one might be picking on the larger one.
Yes, hubby was upset that he disturbed the hog but we were so convinced we only had one hog only to find we had two! No harm appears to have been done though as the hibernating hog is now awake and has plenty of food and water to make up for any weight loss.
We have another hedgehog house that has a lid and one is in there now (don’t intend to keep peeking but it is good to know who is where). During breeding and birthing season we would stop the peeking.
One thing we have learnt from using the wildlife camera is how important water is to hedgehogs. Even if people don’t want to feed hedgehogs it would be great if they could leave a container of water for hogs to drink.
Hi
Yes, I agree, water is vital all sorts of times and one of them is when they come out of hibernation. It is a good idea to have water, always, available in the garden even if there don’t seem to be hogs around – one might turn up.
So the little one was bossing the big one around! I have had one chap here who was very big, but a gentle giant and often got biffed by much smaller hogs, although it is more often the other way round.
I am delighted that a hog has finally come back from hibernation to join the one who’s been here all winter. Needless to say, there was a punch up there too. Boy hogs will be boys! Bit of a shock for the young winter hog. He probably has never met an adult male before and has had the place to himself all winter. He wasn’t to know that he was supposed to roll up! Eventually he did roll up, after a good biffing, but seemed none the worse for wear later on.
You get a good view of the hogs in your feeding box. I might have to try out one like that for rainy nights. The table works up to a point but the food still tends to get a bit wet from splashes. I wonder about having two doors, for an escape route if necessary – or would it weaken the structure too much, do you think?
Hi Nic,
We only have one entrance to stop cats getting in. At least the plastic is soft so even if one is biffing the other there is nothing sharp in there to hurt them.
They do like the feeding station in rainy weather especially. I’ve seen one eat in there and then just stay there as if reluctant to go out in the rain. There are plenty of hedgehog houses and home made log cabins for them to shelter in out of the rain in my garden; but I suppose a shelter with food is quite appealing to hedgehogs!
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