Bonfire Night is an extremely dangerous night of the year for hedgehogs, as they seek shelter in unlit bonfires and perish when they are lit. Bonfires can be easily mistaken by hedgehogs as shelter as they are made of natural materials like wood and have small areas to crawl into. Especially this year, due to COVID19 many were expected to have personal bonfires due to the lack of paid firework presentations. This inexperience could endanger many hedgehogs if certain steps are not followed before creating and lighting personal bonfires. The awareness of this issue must be raised to protect the already dwindling species.
Country Life (2020) identifies tips for those having their own bonfire:
· Don’t build it until the same day that you will light it. The longer it’s left for, the more likely that a hedgehog will find its way into your bonfire.
· If you need to build your bonfire in advance, make sure you place chicken wire one metre high all the way around the bottom. This should be placed at an outward angle to make it more difficult for hedgehogs to climb.
· If you have stored materials for your bonfire outdoors before building it, move them to a different patch of ground before you start.
· Always place the bonfire on open ground – never on a pile of leaves as a hedgehog may be hiding underneath.
· Always check the entire bonfire for hedgehogs before lighting it. Remember that they tend to hide in the centre and bottom two feet in particular.
· When checking, lift parts of the bonfire section by section using a pole or broom. Do not use a fork, spade or rake as this may injure a hedgehog.
· Use a torch to look inside the bonfire and listen for a hissing sound, as this is the noise that hedgehogs make when they are disturbed or distressed.
· Always light your bonfire from one corner, rather than in the centre, in order to give hedgehogs a chance to escape if they need to.
And if you do come across a hedgehog while performing these checks? Carefully remove it to a safe place far from the fire while wearing gardening gloves, and then return it the next day, after dousing the area with water, so that it can return to the same habitat.
Through our Napier Hedgehog Friendly Campus group, we raised awareness on our social media platforms Facebook and Instagram. A comic was created as a friendly reminder to check your bonfire before you set it alight, as if you create it the evening before a hedgehog may have already found shelter in it. Through our social media campaign, we reached over 650 accounts with this information.
The British Hedgehog preservation society also provided us with key flyers and leaflets:
