Reply To: Got an Oggie….maybe two

[Phasmainmachina]

We have three regulars, two in particular are identifiable in the dark by their sounds, the third seems to be pretty quiet. It’s possible there’s a fourth, but because of the garden layout and minimal lighting at night, almost impossible to be certain.
The two we do know of I’ve named Snuffles and Chuckles, which should be pretty self explanatory! Snuffles does exactly that, and loudly; Chuckles, on the other hand, makes funny chuckling, almost clucking noises. Sometimes a bit difficult to hear over the eating noises they make.
There are at least three entrance/exits to my garden, so they can come from any direction, two of which I enlarged for the ‘hogs to get through more easily.
One we had last year which was using a nest I made sadly died, she, (I assume it was female from size and behaviour), showed signs of illness, she was out in daylight, went to sleep in her food dish, and when I picked her up, although she curled up, when I put her in front of her nest, she just stopped half-way in.
I put her into a box full of hay and put that into a dark room, but she was clearly dead the next day.
I wasn’t sure if there would be any come back afterwards, but within a day or two there were three back in the garden after the birds suet pellets!
They do seem to be fairly discriminating regarding food – I put out three dishes with a mixture of suet pellets, mealworms and Go-Cat kibbles, hard ones and soft-centred pockets, the last two seem to be particular favourites, the eat the lot!
I tried cat food of various types, they ate a bit and left most, and one morning I found a dish untouched except for a very large poo right in the middle!
A bit more blunt in their opinion than a Guardian food critic, that’s for certain!
I’ve given up on the cat food now…
Hopefully, we’ll get some more hoglets in the garden this year, we had two in June last year, one fell asleep on the lawn in the shade on a Sunday afternoon!
Too cute for words.