Hedgehogs hibernate in winter in substantial nests, called hibernacula, using medium sized leaves to build them with and often build them in dense brambles, under hedges,  in bushes under sheds and in log piles. Leaving corners of gardens and green spaces messy is a great way to provide hedgehogs with these nesting options in the winter.

Come the summer hedgehogs still make nests but these are generally less substantial and aren’t as well insulated. Using material such as grass and moss, these structures are much flimsier and looser than their winter nests.

To give hedgehogs an extra helping hand, hedgehog houses can be a welcome stay in both the winter and summer. You can find some tips on building a hedgehog home here. By putting some bedding such as straw in your hedgehog house can increase the change of having a prickly resident stay in your hedgehog house.

How to build a hedgehog home

You might also like to consider introducing a feeding station in your garden. It not only helps hedgehogs to keep well feed and to bulk up over the summer, which is so important come the winter, it’s also great to watch hedgehogs often several at once feeding from stations. Often people are worried about hedgehogs becoming reliant on supplementary feeding, but evidence suggests that putting food out for hedgehogs have no detrimental effects in terms on them becoming too reliant and impacting their natural foraging routines. Just remember to feed your hedgehogs meat based cat or dog food and just water to drink.

Here are just some of the interesting behaviours that you might see in your gardens at your feeding stations. In this clip, you can see a hedgehog backing down after being confronted at a food dish, but we like to think really it’s doing a hedgehog moonwalk!