Health advice for Hedgehogs, please.

[Malx]

..such as from Valley Forge, for example. Though I know there are lots of you knowledgable types on the Forum, so please, all pitch in!

N.B. If anyone is reading this while eating, hit the "Back one page" button right now!!

A hedgie who visits my hh canteen kindly left a fresh stool this evening. Now, the stool itself was healthily loose, seemed well-digested and homogeneous (i.e. not bitty or lumpy), apart from 2 small masses of corporal matter: The 1st had some congealed blood in... it was fresh red blood, so it was recent. The 2nd seemed more like skin/flesh cells. Each was small - a lozenge shape perhaps 5mm by 2mm. Nevertheless I'm slightly concerned. If I pooped things like that (which were to scale and therefore 100 times bigger) I'd be wrapping a cushion in a plastic sheet, and putting it on the driver's seat for my journey to Accident & Emergency...

4 factors to consider - listed in possible order of significance:

a) My instincts tell me this is a female.

b) this hedgehog is bullied badly by another hedgie, and was curled up cowering in a corner when s/he released this stool, while the bully had finished hurting him/her, and was feeding. The 'action' was off-camera, so I can't tell exactly what physical damage the bully may have been inflicting on the poor victim.

c) this hedgie seems to have suffered trauma in the past - it's blind in the right eye, and has 2 round 'scars' on its right shoulder. I've only seen this under infra-red light, so I suspect the 'scars' could be ticks, I guess. [Once we're better acquainted, I'll have a proper look, and also try Valley Forge's party trick etc.]

d) I read somewhere today that hedgies are lactose-intolerant. I do feed mine cheese - which they adore - so could this be a big mistake, or is it only liquid milk which is a problem?

Please advise me, anyone who knows. It's probably nothing at all, but as you may gather, I'm growing rather fond of this little visitor whom I first encountered at 0035 in the early hours of Sunday March 28th 2010, not that I'm counting the days or anything...

Cheers.

[posie]

Hi Malx, no milk products allowed, that includes cheese..I've sent Hedgehoggy and ValleyForge a message, but it's a bit late tonight...I think you should catch the poorly hedgehog and get him to a hedgehog sanctuary, as he obviously needs at least assessing, and mainly needs to be kept away from the one who is bullying him....it may be because she/he's ill.I'm sure you'll get a hoggy person in tomorrow if not tonight....Posie..

[posie]

Just had a thought, Malx, I'm not sure if Hhogs have babies this early but in case they do, don't take her in till you're sure she's not suckling babies.You should be able to tell by looking at her teats......Posie...

[posie]

The blood and tissue in the poo could be worm damage. And is she coughing do you know?...And also was the blood and tissue definitely IN the poo or could it have come out of her front passage ONTO the poo?....Posie..

[Malx]

All good questions, Posie, and many of them!

- How come so many sites recommend cheese as a food for hedgehogs? (e.g. Epping Forest Hedgehog Rescue - Feeding Hedgehogs )

- I honestly don't think the hedgie (whom I call "RED" - Right Eye Deficient") is that poorly. S/he trots around merrily, s/he eats like a hog. Has been visiting twice nightly for a week. I only noticed the one bad stool this evening - I've no reason yet to think it's a common thing.

- Regarding the bullying, it's hardly unusual in nature! Not even that unusual in human society... S/he visits my canteen early in the evening, so is usually in there when the other/others arrive, so they probably feel the need to try to push him/her off the trough.

- It's possible s/he might have a litter. S/he usually leaves the canteen and heads towards a nearby HH House, which seems to be being used by someone at the moment. Certainly I've seen no babies though.

- S/he's not coughing at all. Healthy generally. Very quiet when s/he wants to be, and snorts and grunts merrily when on his/her own.

- The unpleasant bits in the stool were definitely on the outside of it, so might have been rubbed off while coming out. Do hedgies get menstrual?

Thanks for the input, Posie. If nothing else, I really must go against my principles and pick the little urchin up. I guess it may be for its own good, but I hope it won't hold this offence against me!

[paulinemiller10]

I would grab your hoggy and check him over, you can find out if its a he or she with a box with glass in the bottom, pop hoggy in and slowly tip it back and fore, hoggy will soon uncurl and try to find his balance, then hold up and you will see underneath, posting pics of male and female, if the female has babes, you will see her teats.

I have a feeding table with a glass sheet and a cam underneath for my hedgehogs, when they step on for supper I switch cams to find out if its male or female, the pics where snapped from this cam, saves stressing hoggy, and a good way to check them.

Your hoggy needs to be weighed, and again in a week or so, if they are losing weight they need to be wormed. Pauline.

Male hedgehog.


Female Hedgehog.

[posie]

Hello Malx, Well I suppose it is early for Hhogs to give birth, but I just wondered if the blood and tissue was post natal discharge. This little darlin' has certainly found his/her way into your heart......One good thing about the situation is that you can put medication into the food, if she/he is first to the trough...

[Malx]

Cheers for the replies, guys. Will try to find out more tonight, Pauline, by employing some of your sneaky methods!

You may have a point, Posie. It also occurred to me that sexual politics may come into things with these two hedgies.
And it may be that the bully hedgehog may not actually be all that familiar, physically, with the female hedhgehog anatomy... if you can work out where this thought is leading.....

Right. Off for breakfast now!

[valleyforge]

Hi there Malx ... sorry I wasn't online late last night ... I'm not that much of a night ranger at this time of year, because in the coming months I know I'm not going to get many undisturbed nights once the 'orphans' start arriving and I'm going to be up every 2 hours or so through the night to feed them. Got to start building-up sleep reserves now.

Anyway, thanks to Posie's PM (thank you Posie) I was alerted to your post as soon as I logged on.

It's great that you've got some hoggie visitors again, and terrific that you are keeping such a close watch on them ... and of course observation of their poo is fundamental in assessing the general health of hedghogs ... and other creatures ... so nothing really distasteful in that (not that I recommend actually tasting it you understand).

It's not too easy to make any diagnosis without seeing the 'patient' (or the poo) of course, but from what you have described there's probably not too much cause for concern, and I would just continue to monitor the situation closely, but I'm sure you'll be doing that in any case.

You've made a few suggestions based on your observations, and had some good input from Posie, so perhaps I can start by expanding on some of what has been written.

First of all, you have described the traces of blood as being bright red ... that normally always points to a peri-anal source rather than something more deep-seated such as internal bleeding (when blood in the stools will appear very dark red or black).

Quite often following a period of starvation (such as hibernation), or partial dehydration, passing of hardened stools can cause some tearing of the rectal lining ... this might be a possibility in this case, but since you describe the faeces to have been 'healthily loose, not bitty or lumpy' then I'm not so sure, since you also mention that 'she' has been feeding for about a week already.

Let's examine what you have described as 'bullying' as a possible answer ... adult wild hedgehogs normally don't react aggressively to each other (though young hand-reared siblings are often seen to tussle to establish their pecking order), neither sex is especially territorial whereby males would not be inclined to 'defend' a patch or food supply by 'seeing-off' other males or females. Rather, they tend just to avoid each other.

Any display of overt aggression is then largely down to courtship encounters ... where a male may be seen to circle and harry a female who may not always welcome such advances ... courtship antics such as these can last for hours, so not surprisingly tempers can arise from both parties once they become tired and frustrated.

Male hedgehogs do have a surprisingly large sexual organ (I suspect the forum net-nanny will probably censor the word 'penis') for their stature, so it's not that unlikely that the little bit of blood you spotted may have been due to some clumsy coital manoevreing ... I'm sure its not that easy trying to mount a reticent spiny partner.

I don't think the problem is down to worm damage .... presence of intestinal worms usually turns at least half the stool a distinctive green colour, not red.

I also believe it would be a little too early for her to be already pregnant, the two peak periods for pregnancies being May-July and September.

You have really good instincts Malx, in that you have probably correctly sexed this animal as being female ... but there's not much harm in having a quick peak to confirm, though I REALLY love paulinemiller's device ... fiendishly clever.

I hope these ramblings have been of some use, but I have to declare that I'm NOT the hedgehog expert on this forum, though I'm somewhat flattered that you'd want my input ... I'd bow to the superior knowledge of hedgehoggy or wildliferescuer any day ... I'm sure they've each handled/raised considerably more hoggies than I have.

So I have to leave you then with my standard disclaimer, which is 'trust me ... I'm a geologist.'

[Malx]

Many thanks, VF. Knew you'd shed some more light on the subject if you were around!
Had a quick look in Kay Bullen's fab book "Hedgehog Rehabilitation" regarding the deposits in the faeces last night, and I did wonder if 'RED' had an endo parasite, i.e worms inside. It's quite common in hedgies, and by no means certain to be fatal; may not be serious at all, as you know. As you point out though, the faeces would usually be GREEN-tinged if there was any stress on the hedgie's system, and 'mine' was not. My hedgehog seems extremely mobile, normal, and definitely has a great appetite.

Have to say it was Packham's influence that has started in me a passing interest in animal scats... The one last night had a very, very distinctive smell - like nothing I'd ever encountered before. Unfortunately I've got nothing to compare it with - so it looks like I've got a lot to learn yet, and I know the neighbours will be concerned about the form of my 'education'...

The small blood vessel-thing last night was such a tiny proportion of the stool that I'm sure you're right about no need for concern.
I'll do all the 'intervening' thing tonight, even if I don't approve of it, really.

I suspect you might be right about the courtship behaviour of my 2 regular visitors, though I wouldn't want any of my female relatives going out with a bloke like that!

Cheers again for helping out, and I'll report back if there's anything of interest.

2015 now - no hedgies as yet - but must be nearly your bedtime, VF?!

(Ta, Posie, for helping too.)