The Work at Les Monts

The hospital is heated 24/7 & the hedgehogs therefore are less likely to hibernate.  However natural instinct cuts in & by weighing every day we are disturbing the hog to remind it to wake, eat & drink.

Baby hedgehogs are given bottles of puppy milk which have to be made up. The bottles contain 2ml of Fennel Tea, made up like a normal herbal tea. Boiling water, left to stand, cooled & placed into a container. Chris will often make a cup of Fennel Tea first thing as it is rarely drunk, so can go into the container for the Hoglets. Then 8ml of the (Royal Canin Baby Dog Milk) puppy milk is added to the bottle, this is then warmed as a human baby bottle would be & fed to the hoglet once it has been weighed. Fennel tea is a way of getting fluids in without just giving it water & hoping it will drink. The 10ml bottles are only to stimulate Hoglets to eat, not for feeding like a human baby. Fennel tea also prevents Bloat, which is a killer. Hoglets below 100g are only given bottles of 5ml max, then over 101g-200g they have a maximum 10ml bottle.

The Hoglets are then weaned gradually at around 100g onto mashed puppy food with Fennel Tea & Puppy milk. The milk is gradually less, the Fennel tea continued & until such time as the Hoglet is happy & big enough to be weaned off bottles & the puppy food increased. As the Hoglet grows, it will be weaned over to 75% puppy & 25% adult is introduced.  If all is eaten after 3 days, it changes to 50/50% for a further 3 days; again if all eaten it moves to 75% Adult & 25% puppy. If all is eaten for a further 3 days then it is fully weaned over to Adult Pedigree in jelly. Often they will not eat the Adult & have to return to puppy until such time as Chris considers they may be mature enough to try again. Babies are initially fed (solids) from jam jar lids, then blue non spill bowls, then increasing in size to spotty bowls, then a carrot bowl (picture of a carrot) progressing eventually to an orange bowl. 

Every hedgehog has its own clip board & its weight, food eaten, poop delivered, food given is recorded daily. The weight & ‘poop’ give Chris the best information needed to show immediately any signs of concern. It also advises any volunteer who may attend, what food is eaten & which size bowl & how much. E.g. it may only be 2-3 chunks for a baby to be mashed etc. through to the bottom of a bowl being covered, then to half a bowl & finally to 2/3rds of a bowl. Green bowls (same size as the Orange) are the largest bowl used for water & we always only half fill those. When you see the pictures of hutches you will note the different bowls. Stone coloured bowls are usually also used for dry food, these are three different sizes from small to medium (shallow) & large bowls, which are equal to the orange bowls. However, we also use larger Rabbit or large Carrot bowls for hutches containing more than one hedgehog or for Kenny! So helping Chris as a volunteer (when able) simply by washing, recording food eaten & given & filling bowls is a huge benefit to Chris as I am sure you can imagine & greatly appreciated. All training is given, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, no volunteers can be accommodated currently. Our regular volunteers have (temporarily) had to be asked not to attend & are greatly missed.