Mary from Bonnybridge Library enlisted the help of her family to create some shelter for wildlife in her garden. Here she is to tell us all about it.
I’ve wanted to build a hedgehog house for quite some time. Last year we had some poop evidence in our back garden that a hedgehog was visiting and neighbours have spotted hedgehogs occasionally in the street too.
Given the current situation, and good weather, I decided to have a go at building a hedgehog house using materials that I had at home, in the garden and garage.
I did a lot of online research on building your own hedgehog house and I liked the brick built versions (plus I had spare bricks). I used instructions from the Natural History Museum.
I chose a shaded area in the front garden along the grass edge. I used bricks, a modified plant pot for the tunnel, an old kitchen door as a solid roof, turf, large stones and logs to cover the roof. Gnome is optional!
I thought the opposite end of the hedgehog house looked too bare, so I decided to relocate my fairy door from my porch to the garden, attached it to a nice piece of old tree, laid a pebble path and decorated with moss etc.
I feel like a big kid but I love the end result, I have put some dried leaves inside the hedgehog house and I will top this up every few days. I put out a little food and it is usually eaten… although it could be foxes – or fairies! Two days ago I saw some small scratch marks at the entrance way and some mud marks in the entrance tunnel.
We shall see how it goes, but it would be really nice to think a little hedgehog, or maybe even some fairies, would like to live here!