Rachel Wise: No more room at the Hedgehog Inn

Rachel Wise.

"Leptospirosis," said my vet, as we walked past each other in the parking lot.

Most people say "hi".

"I forgot to add leptospirosis to the list of things you can catch from hedgehogs," she explained, to my relief as I had thought for a second that she'd forgotten how to speak English.

I wasn't relieved for long.

I googled the symptoms of leptospirosis, which assured me that I didn't have it. But it also assured me that I didn't want it.

Fever, chills, headache, muscle aches, vomiting … would it be excessive, I wondered, to look into buying a hazmat suit and one of those decontamination showers that emergency services have for chemical spills?

Perhaps a bit over the top, I decided, when the hazard was just four small orphaned hedgehogs.

I accumulated the four over the space of a week, when it seemed I'd developed some sort of animal magnetism when it came to attracting starving baby hedgehogs.

While I'd rather attract sweet fluffy kittens or cute roly poly puppies, it seemed for a while I was destined to collect unsociable balls of prickles.

The first two hoglets were treated to a chorus of "oh how cute" from family and the Facebook friends I deluged with photos.

After the third hedgehog turned up I was getting "crazy hog lady" comments and when number four was added there was talk of an intervention.

The final straw was when an article from America popped up on Facebook, warning people not to kiss or snuggle with hedgehogs.

Within moments, several friends had tagged me in.

I was a bit offended.

While I could believe a population that voted for Trump could need a warning not to snuggle unpleasantly spiky animals, I think I might have worked that one out for myself.

But it seems that in some parts of America, hedgehogs are popular pets, but they can share a few bugs that make it a bad idea to kiss them. Even if you can find a hedgehog body part that's safe to kiss without giving yourself a series of facial piercings.

Personally, I can't think of many worse pets than a nocturnal ball of sharp spikes.

During the daytime all I have to show for four hedgehogs is a bundle of hay in a box. An odiferous bundle of hay, as hedgehogs eat a lot, and what goes in has to come out, and they don't have any manners when it comes to where. Food bowl is fine, water bowl is also acceptable, bed is pretty much compulsory.

Just as well I have access to plenty of clean newspaper. And hay, although my horses are starting to look cross about their food supply being carried off, instead of handed over.

After the hoglets have ransacked their cage overnight like invading Vikings sacking a small village, trampled through their leftover food, washed their grubby feet – and heaven only knows what else - in their water bowl, stomped all over their clean newspaper and been thoroughly incontinent in their bedding, I get the fun challenge of gloving up and cleaning them out.

I weigh them in the hope they are nearing their idea "release weight" of 600g. They're not.

I give them fresh newspaper and bedding and food and water and I release them back into their cage and … nothing happens.

They go back to bed, roll up tight and ignore any requests for interaction. Pet rocks would be more fun … at least you could paint them. It's hard to paint a hedgehog (yes I have … a bit … how else was I meant to tell them apart?).

As the sun goes down and sensible entities are heading for sleep, the hoglets wake up and start gnawing loudly on cat biscuits, digging in their hay for mealworms and, from the sounds of it, expressing themselves in interpretive dance.

"Your hogs are noisy," my husband complains as he tries to get to sleep.

I have no clue what the banging and thumping is. When I sneak up on them and snap the light on to see what they are doing, they freeze in place like it's a fun game of statues.

All I get is four motionless hoglets staring up at me. Being stared at by hedgehogs is somehow unnerving. They have very beady eyes.

There's progress occurring though – this weekend's job list includes building an outdoor hedgehog enclosure, safe enough for baby hedgehogs to ransack and sleep in, but outdoors enough to remind them they are wild animals and not permanent house guests.

Because they're not. No, not even one. Not even the smallest and closest-to-cute one. No.

And while I'm on the subject, no more are invited either.

Even though the hedgehog enclosure will be quite spacious, you know, just in case …