Christmas cheer at Stapeley..its hog time

You may have asked yourself what the Stapeley team do on Christmas Day?  Well it was work work as usual (feeding and cleaning) with the added festive cheer; the odd Santa hat, a few mince pies and the occasional Christmas carol along the corridor.

At this time of year hedgehogs and swans make up the majority of our admissions, all needing a helping hand through the winter.  We often get in hedgehogs that were born late in the year and are too small to hibernate; they therefore usually just need some feeding up - puppy chum, meal worms, and small dry dog biscuits usually works.  No turkey or mince pies for these guys.  We record how much each hog has eaten, its preferred food and monitor their weight daily.  This enables us to give the hedgehog more of the food it prefers and reduces waste (every penny counts!!).  We like our hedgehogs to be above 600 grams and the weather conditions fairly mild (above 5 degrees) for a 3-4 days before we release them and although there was an extremely cold stretch early December, the Christmas period has been quite mild allowing us to release a lot of our hogs.

It’s been a busy year for most wildlife centres around the country when it comes to hedgehog admissions; they have even pushed our pigeons of their usual number 1 spot,  as the most admitted animal to Stapeley Grange.

                                                                    

Sponsors of Stapeley Grange Wildlife Centre