Can I tell the sex?

[LeanaG]

So my cameras have now picked up that we have 3 hedgehog visitors! Hedgehog A is the smallest and was eating happily until Hedgehog B (bigger than A) came along and barged A out the way. B then began to eat, until it noticed something and moved over. Then came Hedgehog C (who is huge!). C then started to eat, wasn’t bothered by A (sniffed and moved on). When C left the garden, A started to eat and B didn’t do anything to stop A and waited it’s turn. Is there anyway from their behaviour that I can tell what sex they are? It’s obvious that C is the dominant hog! Any help much appreciated. Our whole family is fascinated watching them.

[Nic]

Hi LeanaG

You may eventually be able to get a pretty good idea of whether male or female hedgehog by their behaviour, but I don’t think there is quite enough information there are the moment. For instance one person’s barging out of the way might be another person’s nudge, etc.

You may be able to see from your video, if you can see a bit underneath the hogs. The males have a blob or sometimes larger, roughly mid-abdomen. It’s often visible on video if they get up on their legs a bit, but also, they sometimes conveniently scratch in front of the camera.

One of the easier behaviours to tell male and female is the courtship circling, where the male circles around the female and she turns round and round in the ‘centre’ the ‘circle’, facing towards him and huffing as she goes.

Keep watching and I’m sure you’ll work it out.
Happy hog watching!

[Nic]

P.S. I get the impression from what you said that maybe you only have one bowl for hog food. It may be a good idea to have several smaller ones if you sometimes have 3 hogs visiting at once – spread out a bit.

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