What are you doing Ted?

I’m playing with my new ball!

What new ball? I don’t have one! Favouritism from Maxine, fancy that.

It’s one I found here in the garden, it makes a fun snuffling noise. And when you poke it with your nose it’s – OUCH!

Spiky?

Yes! Such fun.

Ted, that’s not a ball. That’s a Hedgehog… don’t you pay any attention when Countryfile is on?

No, that’s my dedicated snoring time! Sorry Mr Hedgehog, please accept my sincerest apologies.

We really should petition to make the garden a bit more hedgehog friendly.

How do we make the garden more friendly? Get the sparrows to form a welcoming committee?

Err…. no Ted. We can get Maxine to check all of the slug pellets are Hedgehog friendly, put a little 13 x 13 cm hole in the fence so they can wander freely through the gardens without having to worry too much about their Green Cross code, and we can put out a shallow dish of water and some meaty cat food.

No bread and milk then?

Nope, they’ll eat it because they eat anything, but it’s not good for them. Meaty cat or dog food, or chicken flavoured kitten biscuits only. We should also make sure Maxine and Mattie check piles of leaves and other places they might hide to avoid disturbing them.

Good idea, that.

We should also keep our noses to the ground for hogs who might need our help.

Do they smell?

No, I mean we should look out for them. If one appears to be in distress or there’s a little hoglet without its mum, or there’s one out in the daytime looking confused, it’s likely to be sick or injured. If that’s the case, they definitely don’t need to be nosed about like a ball…..

All right, point taken. So, what are we meant to do?

Put it in a high sided cardboard box lined with fleece, wrap a hot water bottle in a towel and put that in the bottom but make sure there’s enough space for it to move away from the heat if needs be, and don’t let the bottle get cold!

How did you become such a hedgehog expert, anyway?

Because I don’t snore my way through Country File!

Hmmmph.