FEATURE
Heroes for
hedgehogs! Long considered a gardener’s best friend, their numbers are dwindling and our spiky hedgehogs and hoglets are now the ones in need of friends. Luckily for those who get into trouble in this neck of the woods, Animals in Need are dedicated to their cause, as Pulse’s Sammy Jones discovered... 32
H
aving more than 200 patients needing to be looked after every day would be enough to give anyone a headache – not least when they are decidedly prickly in nature. But Lizzie Collins doesn’t have a problem with those who are spending their winter in her care – they are all hedgehogs. Numbers of the spiny mammals are continuing to decline because of multiple factors, but largely because of us. Roads steal the lives of thousands annually, and as we continue to replace green spaces with new builds, and farm the land in new ways, their habitat is simply being lost forever. Lizzie and the team at Animals in Need (AIN) are among those making a very real
difference at a time when it has never been more important. The reason for the rise in numbers of hogs being brought into centres like AIN? Many are simply too small for hibernation – and that’s down to climate change. “They simply aren’t big enough for hibernation,” Lizzie told Pulse, “They need to be 600 grams in weight to hibernate and we are getting them in at 200-300 grams, so half the size they need to be. “They are being born later too, because the weather is warmer – it’s definitely climate related,” she explained. “A lot of the small ones coming in to us this season have a heavy parasite burden, so we treat them with a wormer as soon as they
February 2022 | NN Pulse Magazine | 22,000 Copies delivered every month door to door across Northamptonshire
