I’ve just seen a hedgehog on my back lawn

I was thrilled to see a hedgehog in my garden 2 years ago and started putting out cat food for him. One night I looked out of a bedroom window to see if he'd eaten the food and could see something in the dish. Went outside to look closely and found the dish was full of bloated slugs slurping the cat meat. Yukkkk!

I googled and found that slugs love it, so I didn't put out any more after that.

My brother has 6-8 hedgehogs in the garden a night . His hedgehog food doesn't cost that much and he buys an enormous bag but don't know where he gives it from . Perhaps you Google it and can get it cheaper.

Warning do not let your dog eat the hedgehog food it will give them diarrhoea.

In the village where my brother lives all the fences have arches cut into them for a hedgehog hiway . He puts the food and water in the same place every night after there dog has been out before bed . He hears them behind the end of his garage as their spikes rattle against eachother. As soon as he goes in they dash to the food. He says you don't see a slim hedgehog in the village . He doesn't get rats or mice as the hedgehogs eat all the food first.

Years ago when our children were about six and nine we were staying at my parent’s London house overnight . It was a hot summer night and we sitting outside in their large slightly wild garden , we suddenly saw an adult hedgehog and behind her a line of babies . We woke the children up to see them they were a beautiful sight .I haven’t seen any for years despite having a “shabby” garden and all the neighbours having hedgehog holes in their fences .

My DH sets up a night vision camera in the garden and we are able to watch what goes on whilst we’re in bed asleep. It’s amazing, hedgehogs wander round, eating the food we put out for them but also must be clearing up slugs as well, as we never see any these days. We also have a family of foxes, last year we watched the young ones playing with the dog toys left out out, it was delightful. We live in a large village, surrounded by other houses, so we’re not that rural.

In my previous house someone in our street set up a wonderful hedgehog scheme when she discovered she had a hedgehog family in her garden. We all made hedgehog gates in our fences, stopped using weedkiller and slug pellets and put out water.

Hedgehogs would potter from house to house and often, when I was quiet with a cuppa in the garden at dusk, they would wander in and confidently go about their business. Their legs are surprising long and they can't half shift when they choose to do so.

The Hedgehog Preservation society have a website with lots of information and a shop selling things to help the hogs out.

We saw them in our large garden when we first moved in but sadly no more.I have put food down and bought a hedgehog house and piled dry leaves in places to try and encourage them in the past.Upsettingly the other day I saw 2 flattened on the road nearby.A too regular occurrence.
And the beautiful fields with hedgerows and next to our nearby wood are about to be bulldozed for houses.Almost 1000 going up within a 2 mile radius of our village so it's going to be even tougher for them.So pleased some of you are doing your bit to help them.

We saw one in the garden this morning @ 9 am which was a bit worrying. The kitten food I bought is a bit old now so I went out and bought a fresh bag of Purina One kitten food, which is recommended by Gardeners World. Haven’t seen one in the garden since I saw a couple of youngsters years ago that we had to take to a rescue.

The hedgehogs set off my security lights, so I rush out with a small bowl of food, put it down on the patio and watch them eat, I’m sure there are rats around (aren’t there always?) but neither my neighbours nor myself have seen any since last year.

One concern if you leave out a bowl of special food how do you know it’s being eaten by hedgehogs and is not encouraging rats?

I know some posters disagree, but since I’ve no household pets now - I treat what’s around the garden as ‘pets’ and factor into my household expenditure bird seed/nuts/fat balls etc as well as the hedgehog food and pouches of wet food (bought when it’s on offer).

Many years ago we discovered a hedgehog had given birth in our old shed. The babies were gorgeous, pink and like little hairbrushes. We left them alone just venturing in for the occasional glimpse, seeing them turn brown and they grew really quickly. One day we looked and they'd gone. We checked back every few days but never saw them again, although possibly one of them was the one we occasionally saw in our garden. My biggest surprise the first time I saw a hedgehog in our garden was how long their legs are!

Gosh it’s £13 for a 2.5 kg bag of crunchy food for them. Oh well I’m going soft in my old age and they may as well have it as Rachel Reeves😂

Hey Georgesgran thanks for that. I just googled Spikes hedgehog food and they have a fantastic website all about hedgehogs. I was also able to load up where and when I saw the hedgehog and I’ve signed up for their newsletter. If anyone else sees a hedgehog please do the same as they are in decline. I will buy some of the food in case there are baby hedgies in due course.

We regularly see hedgehogs on Rosie's bedtime walk . She lunges at them and connected once to the detriment of the hedgehog.
I suspect a "run" from under the fence at the back corner of the garden down the side and out of the side gate. With a farmhouse behind us and a spinney beyond that, hedgehogs are common.

Funnily enough, I’ve found hedgehog poo on my lawn today - I’ve a well used hedgehog box in a quiet corner of the garden.
Looking at old photographs, I feed them late summer/autumn, so they can put on plenty of weight before hibernation. I buy a dry hedgehog food ‘Spike’ from my garden centre and add an occasional pouch of wet cat food to it.