Hi LizMalone
That’s great news that you have had several hogs visiting.
Hogs don’t all hibernate at the same time. Males tend to go earlier – no hoglet duties to attend to. Raising hoglets takes a lot out of a female hog and she has to wait until they are going it alone, before she can concentrate on putting on condition for hibernation herself. Often hoglets are the last to hibernate, giving them a bit of extra time to put on sufficient weight.
Some males disappear to hibernate in September. I have one here who built his nest in September, but is still venturing out a bit, although not as far afield as usual, it seems. It remains to be seen whether he finally decides to hibernate completely or not. Some choose not to hibernate, although it mostly seems to be hoglets that I’ve heard about (and had a couple here).
But hibernation isn’t only temperature related, it’s more complicated than that and not really fully understood.
