January 2008
Staff at Shepreth Wildlife Park have been busy for the past couple of months caring for sick and young hedgehogs, left for dead by the harsh winter weather.

These ‘autumn juveniles' have been turning up at the park via members of the public thick and fast, sometimes as many as 6 a day.

“We have been absolutely in-undated this year with underweight hedgehogs. We have always offered to over-winter hedgehogs that could not survive the British winter, but this is the first time in 20 years that we have actually run out of space to keep them,” Rebecca Willers, Animal Collection Manager “We have been lucky our staff and volunteers have stepped in and taken the odd ones home to look after when we were desperate.”

Hedgehogs need to be a minimum 600gms in weight in order to sustain their hibernation period. The hedgehogs being brought to the centre were born too late in the year to find sufficient food, and as a result have been as little as 150gms, and if left in the wild would not survive.

“We are at full capacity now. Fortunately, or rather unfortunately, we do not expect to receive many more hedgehogs as I imagine any remaining youngsters out in the wild would not have survived the cold frosts we have experienced over the past few days.”

The wildlife park does not receive any financial help for this service, but is believed to be the only centre in the area which will take in these animals for the entire winter season. The hedgehogs need to be fed, watered, cleaned and kept at a minimum of 18oc until March/April next year when they can be released back into the wild. The staff rely on the kind donations which the public offer when the hedgehogs are brought in.

Staff at the wildlife park have had to convert their animal quarantine room into a makeshift ‘hedgehog re-hab unit' in order to cope with the high volume of numbers turning up. This is not ideal however, and plans are underway to move their marmosets into a free-range exhibit in their Tropical House, freeing up more space in the ‘Native Species' area for a specialist hedgehog unit. This plan will   also aid the park in concentrating their efforts on future breeding programmes for pine marten, red squirrel and polecats.

Anyone wishing to help the park can do so in the form of cat / dog food! (meat based, not fish)