Hedgehogs, (biological, not Sonic)
Hedgehogs are in trouble, and for once we can't blame the government. Numbers of our little spiny mammal are declining, and it is not exactly clear why, but the internet is helping researchers map the populations.
In the 1950s, there were an estimated 30 million wild hedgehogs in Britain, which had declined to around three million at the start of this century, and all the estimates now place the numbers at below one million. A national survey by the BBC's Gardening Magazine has found that 57% of the readers never saw a hedgehog throughout the whole of 2017. Another puzzle is that fewer and fewer people are seeing the dead hedgehogs squashed on the tarmac. These were once an all too common sight on our roads and the car was certainly a major factor in hedgehog mortality, but have you seen one recently? Is this absence of squashed hedgehog simply because the population is smaller, or have they moved into different areas away from the roads?
The relationships in ecosystems can be complex and there are rarely simple straightforward answers. For example, with our warmer milder summers we have seen increases in slug populations. Slugs make a tasty meal for hedgehogs so you would think this should help the animal. However, this may also result in gardeners using more slug pellets, and slug pellets are highly toxic to hedgehogs.
Information on numbers and distribution of hedgehogs, (alive or dead), is helpful in understanding the state of the hedgehog population. Traditionally, biologists could only do carefully controlled evaluations over small areas but the internet opens up the possibility of greatly expanding the search area. This website, Hedgehog Street, crowd-sources hedgehog sightings.
As with any crowd-sourced data, some of it has to be taken with a pinch of salt, and remember that people are not always as accurate as they should be when entering data. If you look at the Big Hedgehog Map on that site, (which is a big map of hedgehogs, not a map of big hedgehogs), you will see that some of these hedgehogs appear to be swimming the English Channel and are in danger of being squashed by the Cherbourg ferry.
The Mammal Society is also asking for help from people to record sightings of our wildlife, including hedgehogs, and has produced a mobile phone app to make it easier for people to record and report the wildlife they see on walks and cycle rides.
30th May 2018
This article comes from the SKILLZONE email newsletter, published monthly since January 2008, and covering topics related to technology and the internet. All articles and artwork in the SKILLZONE newsletter are orignal content.