What Are the Natural Enemies of Hedgehogs? A Rundown of Animals That Prey on Hedgehogs

We know that hedgehogs are nocturnal animals. When startled, a hedgehog bends its head toward its belly, curls its body into a ball, rolls up into a spiky sphere, tucks its head and limbs inside, and raises all its spines to protect itself. So, what are the natural enemies of hedgehogs?

1. What are the natural enemies of hedgehogs?

The main natural enemies of hedgehogs are carnivorous animals such as martens, owls and foxes. They are far larger than hedgehogs, and catching a hedgehog requires little skill.

2. What characteristics do hedgehogs have?

1. Heterothermic animal

Because they cannot steadily regulate their body temperature to keep it at a constant level, hedgehogs hibernate in winter. Apart from the belly, a hedgehog's whole body is covered in stiff spines. When it encounters danger, it curls into a ball covered in spines. Its appearance and gentle temperament are very endearing, and some breeds are only slightly larger than a human palm, so in Australia some people keep them as pets.

2. Keen sense of touch and smell

Hedgehogs have very long snouts, and their senses of touch and smell are highly developed. Their favourite food is ants and termites. When it smells food underground, it digs open a hole with its claws, then sticks its long, sticky tongue into the hole and turns it around, and immediately gets a hearty meal. Hedgehogs live in bushes, can swim, and are afraid of heat. Hedgehogs begin hibernating in late autumn and do not wake until the following spring, when the temperature warms to a certain level. Hedgehogs like to snore, similar to humans.

3. Preying on pests

Because they prey on large numbers of harmful insects, hedgehogs are beneficial animals to humans. Hedgehogs also eat fledglings, bird eggs, frogs, lizards and so on, and occasionally eat crops.

4. Timid and solitary by nature

The hedgehog is a very solitary animal. It lives in bushes, is timid and easily startled, prefers quiet to noise, likes darkness and fears light, and fears both heat and cold. Hedgehogs move slowly and are generally active by night and hidden by day. Hedgehogs dig burrows as nests, hiding in the nest during the day and coming out to move about only after dusk. Hedgehogs can generally resist many kinds of poisons, but they cannot resist insecticides, and sometimes they die of poisoning after accidentally eating insects killed by insecticides. Under normal circumstances, hedgehogs stay away from areas of human activity and like to make their nests at the edges of wild country land or beside streams.

Hedgehogs are relatively sensitive to and afraid of outside things. If we see a hedgehog in the wild, we should not deliberately frighten it.