Where’s Harriet gone? Could she be pregnant?
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First-time poster:
A hedgehog I’ve named Harriet has been visiting my garden most (although not every) nights since 23 March this year. She has a hedgehog house and a feeding station where I put out special hedgehog food and fresh water every evening. For many nights in May and June I could almost set my clock by her regularity – between 10.18pm and 10.25pm. Several times in late May I was lucky enough to witness the hedgehog mating ritual. I went away for two weeks in early July and a neighbour kindly put fresh water and food out for Harriet every evening, although she didn’t always turn up at the feeding station. I regularly sit in the garden in the evening, ‘hedgehog watching’, and have seen her feed, to in and out of her house and wander freely about my garden (she particularly likes the large laurel bush), but since I have been back from holiday I have only seen Harriet once (and not at all for the last four nights). Her food is partially disappearing, but I’ve seen slugs feasting there so they may be responsible. Her water bowl has been emptied several nights, but she hasn’t been into her hedgehog house (the leaves I place strategically at the entrance haven’t been moved). Just before I went away – early July – Harriet ‘rearranged the furniture’ in her house, chucking out some of the straw I’d provided and dragging in large chunks of conifer! Could she be pregnant? Is this nesting behaviour? Maybe she’s gone away for a week or so to have the hoglets? Is she likely to return or has she abandoned her hedgehog house and my garden?Are you sure she’s not in the house? They can stay with the babies for the first few days and not move. It’s also possible that you going away meant she built another nest somewhere else. She may well be back don’t give up hope
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