Wildlife garden
A hedgehog-friendly garden: how to help hedgehogs
A garden becomes hedgehog-friendly with a 13 × 13 cm gap in the fence to the neighbours, an untidy corner of leaves and branches to hibernate in, a shallow dish of water, and no slug pellets or robotic mower at night.
What to do
- Make a 13 × 13 cm gap at the bottom of your fence or wall, ideally together with your neighbours, so hedgehogs can roam from garden to garden.
- Leave an untidy corner with leaves, branches and prunings under shrubs, or build a dead hedge: they sleep there and find food.
- Plant native shrubs and a hedge, such as hawthorn, hazel, holly and bramble: underneath they find shelter and insects.
- Put out a shallow dish of water, especially in dry summers. Never give milk: hedgehogs cannot digest it.
- Don’t use slug pellets or other pesticides, and never run a robotic mower in the evening or at night.
- Check a leaf pile, compost heap or dead hedge carefully before moving it, and give a pond a gently sloping bank that a hedgehog can climb out of.
Why it helps
- A hedgehog walks one to two kilometres every night looking for beetles, caterpillars, earthworms and slugs. Closed fences and walls shut it into a single garden.
- Hedgehogs hibernate from November to March in a dry pile of leaves, branches or compost, and need plenty of food in autumn to build up their strength.
Which plants?
- Hazel Corylus avellana Shrub · flowers January–March Native
- Hawthorn Crataegus monogyna Broadleaf tree · flowers May Native
- Holly Ilex aquifolium Broadleaf tree · flowers May NativePoisonous
- Common ivy Hedera helix Climber · flowers September–November NativePoisonous
- Bramble Rubus Shrub · flowers June–August Native
- Guelder rose Viburnum opulus Shrub · flowers May–June Native
- Dog rose Rosa canina Shrub · flowers June Native
- Hornbeam Carpinus betulus Broadleaf tree · flowers April–May Native
- Beech Fagus sylvatica Broadleaf tree · flowers April–May Native
When?
March–November.
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Take up the challenge
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Leave the leaves (October–November)
Leave leaves under shrubs or make a leaf pile: a winter shelter for hedgehogs and insects. -
Put out a water dish (June–August)
Put out a shallow dish of water with a stone in it, for birds, hedgehogs and insects. Refresh it every few days.
Did you know? A hedgehog has around 6,000 spines. When it rolls up, a ring-shaped muscle draws its skin closed like a bag.