A New Home At Last

Toad, Oliver, Charlie and Daisy arrived way back at the end of August last year.  They were a litter of baby hogs; all had somehow got themselves covered in a chemical thought to be a pesticide.  Just handling them caused irritation to my own skin as their spikes would puncture the latex gloves I was wearing.

With in a few days of their arrival all were suffering from some degree of spike loss due to chemical burns, with open weeping sores.  Skin samples which were sent off to the lab for analyzing, confirmed the presence of both bacterial and fungal infections.  This saw the start of a lengthy course of treatment, initially all were receiving regular antibiotic injections at the vet, then once the hoglets had improved enough, they were put on a course of oral antibiotics which had to be given twice a day.  At first all did well, continuing to gain weight and growing as they should. The spike loss varied from hedgehog to hedgehog, Toad was the worst with three quarters of his spikes missing as well as the fur on his tummy, Daisy was almost as bad, Oliver only had about a quarter of his spikes missing and Charlie only had one or two small bald patches, hardly missing any spikes at all. 

Sadly Daisy just stopped growing. She was loosing weight rapidly despite hand feeds, antibiotic injections, appetite stimulants and anti parasitic treatment; she was just fading away in front of us. At the start of October I had to make the difficult decision along with the vet’s advice to have Daisy put to sleep, there was nothing else we could do.

Toad, Oliver and Charlie all made slow, steady progress and in the middle of October the vet thought their sores healed enough tackle the fungal infection they were still suffering from, this involved a daily bath for all three, with an anti fungal and antibacterial shampoo.  This was a very time consuming and tricky exercise, all three had to be kept inside on a heat pad until properly dried to prevent chills and then tea-tree ointment had to be applied to soothe their skin, before they could go back out to their hutches in the shed.  This routine carried on for three months with the time between baths gradually increasing. 

When Spring arrived Charlie was fit for immediate release, he was moved out to an outside run to allow him to reacclimatise, after a week he was released.

Oliver was the next to go at the start of June, unfortunately after two weeks of freedom; I had him brought back to me!   Oliver had got himself trapped in a hole which had been dug for a fence post, he may have been trapped for up to four days, and his front claws had completely disappeared due to him trying to dig himself out.  His front paws were in a bad way; he was dehydrated and had lost a lot of weight. 

At first I was not sure if it was him or another local hedgehog, I can tell some apart, hedgehogs are just like people, they have different colourings in their fur and spikes.

I knew it was him for definite once I had given him a bath to remove all the muck he was caked in!

Oliver seemed happy to be back in his old hutch in the shed and he would appear as soon as the door was opened in the evening ready for his dinner.  Oliver had his paws bathed daily for a fortnight, to keep the wounds clean and prevent any infection from setting in, in the nail beds which were exposed.  After a month in the shed I felt it was now time for Oliver to be released again.

Toad made slow progress all winter, although his spikes did come back in, they then fell out again and although some have now regrown he still has too bald an area to be released back into the wild.  Toad is such a character and as we had come so far I was determined to find a good home for him, somewhere where he will be allowed his freedom but checked on regularly to see he is alright.  I had been in regular contact with Borders Animal Welfare over the Summer as they were advising me about a rabbit who was brought to me.  I had mentioned Toad to them and one of the staff there who has a huge garden offered to take him home. 

On Saturday morning we loaded both Toad and Oliver into a cat carrier and set of to Borders Animal Welfare in Earlston. I had a chat with the manageress there last Thursday and she was happy for Oliver to go with Toad to his new home.  It could not have been raining heavier if it tried.  We got down there around midday and the staff were kind enough to show us round the animal shelter.  Having volunteered in another animal shelter as a student I was very impressed with what I saw.   All too soon it was time to leave Toad and Oliver, who were going on to their new home later on that day, I have to admit I felt a little sad as I had been looking after them for so long.  I am pleased though that they will be well looked after and their new home is over an acre in size, where the intention is they will live as a wild hedgehog, free to come and go as they please, food will be left out for them nightly and they will be checked over regularly.