wildlife

Ethical gifts for wildlife lovers

Ethical handmade Christmas gifts
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I originally wrote this post for Christmas but all these items make fabulous gifts for wildlife lovers all year round!

Please think about buying handmade and ethical this Christmas. You not only get a lovely gift but charities also benefit. There are lots of charities that sell products to raise funds for their work. My hedgehog rescue is entirely self-funded and I make jewellery to raise funds. I make all of the jewellery from recycled silver.

Here are some other ideas to help you shop ethically this Christmas, all of which support wildlife; from adopting a hedgehog through to being a wildlife rehabilitator for the day. I’ve also included some gifts that don’t give to charity but will help wildlife in other ways. Why not give a hog a home?

Happy shopping and thanks for buying gifts that give back!

If you have any other suggestions for great ethical gifts for wildlife and nature lovers, please get in touch!

British Wildlife Gifts – proceeds support wildlife conservation and rescue charities

Be a wildlife rehabilitator for the day – gift

Adopt a hedgehog – Wildlife Trusts

Sponsor an animal in rehabilitation – Whitby Wildlife Sanctuary

Creature Candy – 10% of proceeds support wildlife rescue

People’s Trust for Endangered Species – Christmas gifts

Adopt a Bee

Give a hedgehog a home

Little Silver Hedgehog – raising funds for hedgehog rescue

Seedball – gorgeous tins of seeds for growing a wildlife meadow and bee/butterfly friendly borders

Provide a beautiful mosaic drinking bowl in your garden for visiting hedgehogs and other wildlife – I love these wildlife inspired designs and they are the perfect height for wildlife.

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Little Silver Hedgehog Jewellery

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Some of the hedgehogs that I have rehabilitated and released

I run a hedgehog hospital in York. My work is entirely self funded. You can also support my work here.

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Hedgehog hydrotherapy – hedgehogs can swim well but they can’t swim forever

Hedgehog hydrotherapy
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Here is Honey – a wild European hedgehog in my rescue centre – having hydrotherapy.

When Honey arrived with me two weeks ago she would not eat and could hardly walk. She was pulling herself along with her front legs with her nose touching the ground.

The x-rays show nothing obviously wrong but it looks as if the muscles in her front legs could be weak. She walks with an odd gait with her front legs. She is receiving hydrotherapy to help build up the muscle strength.

She swims in a bath of warm water. She can just touch the bottom of the bath, which helps to stop her getting too stressed. She is only in the bath for a brief period as she is weak and can quickly tire with the exercise. She has already improved with her walking after only 5 hydrotherapy sessions.

 

Hedgehogs are actually great swimmers and can cross ponds and even rivers. However, like humans they cannot swim forever. Many hedgehogs drown in garden ponds if they cannot easily find an escape route and get tired. Please make sure you provide easy escape routes from all garden ponds – there need to be many escape options. If there is only one escape option, they won’t necessarily find it.

Honey will carry on with the hydrotherapy until hopefully she improves in her walking.

UPDATE: Honey eventually made a good recovery and was released back to the wild.

I run a hedgehog hospital in York. My work is entirely self-funded. You can support my work by perusing my handmade silver jewellery or making a donation. You can also read more about my hedgehog rescue work here.

 

WANTED – homes for hedgehogs!

Hedgehogs feeding in garden
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“I want a garden hedgehog!” If I had a pound for every time I’ve heard that, I would be a rich woman!

I’m on the lookout for suitable release sites for 30+ hedgehogs that have spent the Winter in care. I want the best of the best for these rehabilitated hedgehogs so please let me know if you can offer the perfect des-res. Below are the minimum requirements that all homes must meet. I am looking for homes within 5 miles of York but other hedgehog rescues will have similar criteria.

1.. You must already have hedgehogs regularly visiting your garden. This is the only way to know that the habitat is suitable and that the hedgehogs will find a mate. You can’t just release one or two hedgehogs and hope they will colonize an area. If hedgehogs aren’t in the area, sadly, there is a reason…..

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You must already have hedgehogs regularly visiting your garden

2. You must be well away from busy main roads – hazardous to hedgehogs.

3. You and your neighbours must not use slug pellets, pesticides or herbicides – all of these can cause poisoning and death. You must also avoid use of garden netting, check carefully before strimming and forking (and ideally not strim your garden at all)

4. Your garden must be linked to at least 10 large gardens via hedgehog holes/hedges/open fencing. The ideal garden will offer plenty of ground cover for foraging and nest sites.

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The perfect garden will offer wild areas for foraging and shelter

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The best release sites will be packed with native plants to attract insects – beetles and caterpillars are the top two foods for hedgehogs

5. You must provide a suitable escape route from any ponds.

6. You must provide some form of shelter. This can be anything from a homemade house  under a log pile, to a specially purchased hedgehog box. This will give your new resident a helping hand to set up home.

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A hedgehog house made under our log store from bricks, twigs and leaves. It provides great shelter from the elements and also a home for insects.

7. You must leave food and water out daily for at least the first month and ideally forever. For advice about feeding hedgehogs, read my blog

8. Not near badger sites. Badgers will predate hedgehogs where they live in close proximity.

If you didn’t get past the first essential requirement, many people find that if they leave food and water out regularly, they discover they do have hedgehog visitors!

If you are interested in being a release site, drop me a line via my Facebook page

My work rehabilitating hedgehogs is entirely self funded. I raise funds for medicines, food and equipment by making silver jewellery inspired by nature – great ethical gifts! You can also support my work in other ways here.