Putting hedgehogs to work

A Te Kūiti resident is part of an “underground” hedgehog support network that keeps and cares for hedgehogs because they are a poison-free way to rid a property of slugs, snails and cockroaches.

“My driveway and footpath used to be covered in snails and slugs. You’d come home at night, and it was like a crunch fest,” said Gina (who wants only her first name known)

“Now I don’t have them, no slugs, snails. Occasionally you see a striped tiger slug, but they don’t last very long. [The hedgehogs] eat them all and they keep away all those big fat cockroaches – the ones that are always coming into the house. As soon as the hedgehogs began hanging round and living under my house, they don’t come.”

She’s had hedgehogs under her house for about five years. She’s seen six at one time, but they move around, coming and going.

She catches them every couple of months to check them for mange and apply flea treatment. The checked “hogs” are marked with nail polish. If they have mange, they are brought inside.

Current resident “hog” Bellamy is being treated for mange and has received a light rub with warmed olive oil after most of his prickles fell out.

“They get a bit of dry skin without their prickles,” Gina said.

“When they are falling off – you never pull them off. Once you have treated the mange, putting olive oil on it helps the prickles fall off in clumps.”

Mange is a skin disease caused by microscopic mites that burrow into the skin of mammals. There are different species of mites that can cause the disease, which in humans is known as scabies.

On the Facebook page Hedgehog Rescue NZ, people share advice for hedgehog care and arrange transport for rescued hedgehogs.

Gina disputes Department of Conservation claims that hedgehogs are dangerous predators that live off native bird eggs.

“Humans destroy more native birds than any hedgehog does with our poisons and our deforestation cutting down their trees because people want to put a shed up,” she said.

“We harm more of our wildlife than a hedgehog does. Can they climb trees? They say they can, but I’ve never seen one do it.  I doubt very much they could creep up on anything apart from slugs and snails, maybe a lizard. I’ve got lizards I’ve seen them hanging around and I’ve built little hidey holes for them that hedgehogs can’t get into.”

Gina said cars would kill more birds than hedgehogs would.

“The amount of hawks I’ve seen lying dead on the side of the road, or magpies  and pukekos. No one is saying you need to slow down or get rid of cars. Everyone just wants to blame a hedgehog,” she said.

A neighbour who is an avid gardener has built a little hedgehog home because they consider hedgehogs a more organic pest control method than poisons and bait.

“Slugs eat the poison, which kills the birds that eat them, and it goes into the ground and into the vegetables,” she said.

“Hawks will pick up a dead rat. I don’t think a hedgehog could do that much. I think they are greatly misunderstood.”

Hedgehog population doubles

According to the Predator Free NZ website, New Zealand has one of the world’s largest introduced hedgehog populations with an estimated two to four hedgehogs per hectare in many parts of the country, and perhaps double that in some undefined areas.

Away from suburban gardens, DOC researchers have discovered that hedgehogs are omnivorous predators that are inflicting damage on native species unable to deal with them.

Hedgehogs eat wētā. A hedgehog discovered by DOC researchers in the South Island’s upper Waitaki Basin was found to have 283 wētā legs in its stomach – about 47 wētā worth in a single night.

In the same study, 22% of hedgehogs were found to have wētā remains in their stomachs. The area is home to many endangered species like ground nesting kea, rock wren and the scree wētā in the alpine zone. And braided river species such as wrybill, robust grasshopper, banded dotterel, and the world’s rarest wading bird, kakī/black stilt.

In the Mackenzie Basin, hedgehogs are responsible for one in five predator attacks on nests.

On the coast, hedgehogs are a major threat for ground-nesting birds like banded dotterel. They eat the eggs and kill the chicks.

A hedgehog can swim more than 800m in search of food in a single night. They are also able to climb hedges and high walls.

Hedgehogs are abundant through the lowland and coastal districts, less numerous in hills and are scarce in mountainous areas.

They don’t like cold and wet and are scarce where rainfall exceeds 250cm a year or where more than 250 frosts occur annually.