Bestest Comments: African Pygmy Hedgehog

My sons & I recently found an Albino-African Hedgehog.So Cute he is. Is a male- My son took him to the vet & the spca.To see what some of the care options are of caring for this cute lil critter.He is defnatly scared. Iam trying to bond with him. What My Question is.WHat type of bedding and all do they Use? Or need. Any help is greatly appreciated. Ty Dee

This site's information is excellent. A couple of things: please be careful of commercially packaged foods labeled as specifically for hedgehogs. Some lack the protein these insectivores require to be healthy. A poultry-based, inexpensive grade of catfood (NOT hairball formulas) is just fine. Be careful of gathering bugs from your yard for your pet; some can have parasites, etc. that can harm your sweet hedgie. Store-bought mealworms and crickets (live or freeze-dried) are safe. A bit of well-cooked chicken or turkey will be well-received, also. African hedgehogs are decended from hedgehogs that DO NOT hibernate, so if one of these pets gets so cold it becomes sluggish and tries to hibernate, it can die. So please keep your baby comfortably warm, but not hot. Their nails need trimmed once in a while, so use baby clippers. If your hedgehog tries to ball up, never attempt to force it to open; you can cause serious, perhaps mortal, injury to your pet. As you build trust in your hedgehog, it will usually allow itself to be groomed more readily, which also eases the stress of visits to the vet. Enjoy your hedgie!

I have a hedgehog. Her name is Maple and she is the best pet ever! She will sleep on my lap in her blanket all day since hedgehogs are nocturnal. You wouldn't think a hedgehog would be a very "cuddly" pet but they are(or Maple is anyway). She also won second place in a hedgehog show! The downsides to having a hedgie is having to clean them and their wheel every day. I clean her cage every other day. The wheel also gets squeaky and since hedgehogs are nocturnal they run on their wheel at night. Trust me it is not fun to have a squeaky hedgehog wheel when you're trying to sleep! To fix this all you have to do is oil it with olive oil every night. And Hedgies cost a lot. I got maple for $150. Their supplies don't cost that much, although we bought more than we needed. The supplies that seem to work for us are: Food dish, water dish(Maple gets most of her water from her bath though. She won't drink from her dish), cat food(we also give her mealworms and corn sometimes), wheel, and litter box (but we found that litter really isn't needed although you still want a litter box to put the wheel in seeing as how they "go to the bathroom" when they are on their wheel). For caging, we use a plastic storage bin(we want to get something that isn't plastic but we haven't got around to it yet). We just use fleece to line the bottom of the bin. She likes to sleep under the fleece so we don't need to buy anything for her to sleep in. It's nice to have some "hedgehog towels" around for drying off after a bath or for handling. You are supposed to have the heat up to around 74 degrees F but we have our heat set to 70 deg F. Our heat also drops to about 63 deg F at night but Maple is fine so that's not a big issue for us. All in all getting a hedgehog is totally worth it (in my opinion anyway)! And I love having Maple around! For those of you who want a hedgehog and don't know where to find them Google: Hedgehog Central and go to the breeder's list.

To the person who asked about hedgehogs and where to get them, try craigslist. or hoobly.com. There are always people trying to sell their pets. I rescued my rupert from an animal rescue place since I don't believe in buying animals from petstores.

Don't forget to clip your hedgies nails regularly. This can be time consuming. It is best to try after their bath, and this is sometimes no easy task. Be careful not to clip too short as they will bleed if you cut into the quick. If you plan on breeding them, get a young animal. If they haven't had their first litter by 18 months of age, they may experience difficulties during the birth. just a couple hints from a former experienced owner/raiser but not a commercial breeder.

We have a total of 14 animals, all of which were rescued from abusive/neglectful homes. What I discovered about hedgehogs is that they are wild, not domesticated, animals. I always study up on the behavior of any animal we live with. Spiny Norman was fine in his clean crate with aspen chips and a wheel, fed on dry cat food. after reading up, I added a driftwood stick (pet store, reptile section), alfalfa hay, and a pressed alfalfa hut. Norman immediately sniffed the new additions and totally annointed himself. He is so much happier since I tried my best to replicate his natural environment. He also has a pan of water big enough to get in (only 1" deep). I try to handle him as little as possible, though he will take crickets or mealworms from my hand, and comes out whenever I come in the room. He is in the small rodent room and the big animals are not allowed in there. Norman is about six yrs old now and very healthy. I lined his crate with slate tiles & now his nails stay worn down. Oh yeah, don't feed fatty foods - it messes up their liver.

I had a four year old female hedgehog named Dafina. Unfortunately, there is a disease called "Wobbly Hedgehog Syndrome" that has very little information on it. She stopped eating and drinking completely, and was constantly throwing up any and all medications/dextrose/glucose that I had her on. (She went to the vet) Hedgehogs become off-balance and wobbly when they have this weird neurological disease. She became paralyzed in three of her legs and could not move. In short, I had to have her euthanized far before her time. I did all the right things for her through her entire life but this is a disease that isn't well known. No one is sure what causes it and how to treat it. I just wanted to inform all the hedgehog owners out there of this possibility. I have heard that it is uncommon to see this--but I also want to say that all of you need to enjoy your little ones while you have them, spikes and all. If they do not cuddle, or ever become socialized, continue to love them with all your heart.

Hi, I run an animal santuary in England and keep 4 hedgehogs (2 male and 2 female) in what used to be my utility room. I have partioned the room off into four parts so they are all kept individually. They are all relatively timid but do not mind handiling. You have to handle them gently as they are delicate. They each have a bird house to sleep in and it has hay in it. Mine get active at around five to eight in the evening, they are very playful. I made them each a wooden wheel which they enjoy. I feed them on dry cat food and water with a little bit of kitten milk in. They are taken to the vets on a regular basis (I have had no health problems with them yet) along with all my other animals.

I got my hedgehog about a year ago , she is a one of the most unusual pets of all of them which consists of dogs, cats, birds, hamsters, fish, rabbits and more. My hegehog loves to be out of her cage to roam arond the house and explore.

I work at a pet store and our hedgehog loves Tender Vittles for cats. The odor is stinky but not unbearable. Just a little thought in case you would like to try it...!!!!!