Hedgehog vs squirrel

[Prickly Pair]

I think i need a bit of practical advice................

I have a hedgehog in hibernation. I leave dry food nearby in case he awakes and needs a quick snack. Unfortunately, we also have squirrels that visit. Being smart little bl***ers, they have found the food and are eating it (at least i think it is the squirrels).

Does anybody have any suggestions apart from catching and relocating the culprits?

How bad is it if the hog wakes up and finds no dry food to eat - is there enough in a garden to keep him going?

Should i put some dry food in his house/nest, or might that make matters worse with the squirrels?

Any advice would be welcome.

Thx

[valleyforge]

Hi PP,

I'm guessing that you are probably leaving out a dried 'Hedgehog mix' food that contains grain & nuts as well as extruded pellets?

If you replace that with dried cat crunchies (chicken or turkey flavour) then that will keep your hog going if he pops out for a snack, and shouldn't be attractive to the squirrels.

If however you are just leaving meat-based dried food, then maybe it's being scoffed by other rodent visitors and not the (grey?) squirrels.

[Prickly Pair]

The dry food is chicken flavoured Iams kitten biscuits (posh hog!). There are also mealworms, which it didn't touch.

The squirrels are grey squirrels.

Do you think it would create any problems if i left the food well inside the hoghouse - or is it likely to attract pests into the house?

[Hedgehoggy]

Hi again PP I wouldn’t recommend putting food directly into Vyv’s house, it could attract all manner of unwanted attention. I was going to suggest putting the food out only at night and bringing it back in again in the morning if squirrels were the culprits, but squirrels wouldn’t be interested in chicken cat bics (at least they’re not here!). Other possible culprits could be cats, birds, or rats (I’ve seen the Blackbirds bravely venturing into my cat-proof hog feeding station to steal the hog’s cat bics – even though I put food out specially for them daily!

One guaranteed option (which I use when soft-releasing hedgehogs) to safeguard Vyv’s winter store is to place a rabbit run (or similar) over the house and food - you could cover part of the run with waterproof roof-felt or similar to keep the house and food dry. Once Vyv wakes permanently from hibernation, if you want to keep the set-up in-situ and let him have the freedom of your whole garden, cut a small gap in the wire mesh of the run and wedge a piece of U-bend pipe (large enough for Vyv to fit through) into the gap - this would permanently prevent cats and birds from entering to steal the food (don't know about rats though - fingers crossed your culprits aren't rats!!).

[Prickly Pair]

Thanks Hedgehoggy.

I will put the food out close by in a feeding station. If it is unlikely to be squirrels, i can only think that it is rats or birds. I don't believe that cats can get in to where the food is located. We have cheeky blackirds here too, and the robins are past masters at sneaking in and stealing the mealworms!

The only way i am going to find out is to catch them (humanely of course!). If it is a bird, it gets released. Anything else can get relocated to the nearby countryside.

I like the rabbit run idea - might give that a try if all else fails.

Cheers,
PP