“Grow Calderdale” is Calderdale Council’s gardening newsletter. It’s an excellent read and you can read the full version of their March newsletter here.
In this month’s newsletter, this article caught our eye – if you do nothing else this summer, perhaps consider making one or two adaptations to your garden or local outdoor spaces to help wildlife.
Hedgehogs usually come out of hibernation in March and then focus on feeding themselves up ready for breeding in May. Hedgehogs travel up to 2 miles in an evening, so they need access to several gardens to get enough food.
The best way to help them is to make sure they can get out of your own garden into next doors (with the agreement of your neighbours). Visit Hedgehog Street to find out more. There are lots of things we can do in our gardens to make life easier for these lovely creatures.
A big challenge is our desire as gardeners to eradicate slugs. Traditional slug pellets have been responsible for the deaths of a huge number of hedgehogs who eat the poisoned slugs which then poisons the hedgehog. There are alternatives available now but any kind of chemical may be harmful to hedgehogs and are best avoided. Less harmful options include the use of beer traps or going round your garden with a torch when it is dark removing as many slugs as you can and relocating them to a wilder part of the garden or compost heap where they won’t create a problem! The Wildlife Trusts and The Royal Horticultural Society have teamed up to encourage people to Make Friends with Molluscs find out more here: The Wildlife Trusts and RHS ask gardeners to make friends with molluscs | The Wildlife Trust
Hedgehogs need access to water but if the water in your garden is in the form of a pond, then you need to make sure it has a shallow edge to allow hedgehogs to drink without getting stuck in the pond. Another potential garden hazard is netting. If you have any pea netting, leave gap of c30cm under the net so hedgehogs don’t get caught in the net. Windblown litter can be dangerous, especially things like yogurt pots and the plastic around multipacks of beer, elastic bands or elastic on masks so keep an eye out and remove any you find.
Removing manmade litter is great but don’t tidy up too much vegetation or piles of dead leaves in the quieter areas of your garden as these areas make great nesting sites for your spikey visitors.
If you know you have regular hedgehog visitors and would like to supplement their food source find out more here, Feeding – The British Hedgehog Preservation Society (britishhedgehogs.org.uk) The British Hedgehog Preservation Society also have a wide range of leaflets offering all sorts of advice about sharing your garden with hedgehogs Leaflets – The British Hedgehog Preservation Society (britishhedgehogs.org.uk).
Enjoy sharing your garden.