Hedgehogs Work In Progress
Hedgehog work in progress
One of our hogs

Hello! This is my very first blog post for my website, and I thought I’d use it to tell you a little bit about my inspiration for my hedgehog jewellery collection.

As I sit here typing this, there are currently 2 hedgehogs having a ‘huff off’ in my garden while I watch them through the patio doors! We’re very lucky to have lots of prickly visitors here, after a few years with none at all. I still remember them rustling in the bushes when I was small- it’s so lovely to have them back! These gorgeous little guys have unfortunately diminished in numbers over the last few years- caused by loss of natural habitat, not helped by concreted gardens and astro turf lawns, along with solid gravel boards under fencing which prevents them from travelling to eat and mate. These little cuties are really in trouble.

So when my local wildlife hospital put out a call on social media, asking for suitable release sites  for their recovered hedgehogs, my hand went straight in the air! Having hedgehogs naturally already, we knew that we had the perfect habitat for hogs, and have now taken just over 30 (yes, really!!) hedgehogs for the wildlife hospital. The hospital take in sick and injured hedgehogs (and plenty more besides hogs!) treat them and when they’re well, they need somewhere safe to be released back into the wild. We provide houses, food, water and a watchful eye- sometimes the hogs hang around for months visiting us most nights and using the nesting boxes, other times they disappear back into the wild on their first night here. We have hedgehog highways under our fences to allow the hedgehogs to travel- and nearly our whole street has got involved too- creating more habitat and holes for the hogs to travel through! Our neighbours across the road currently have 4 hoglets and a mum, and I’m hoping that we’ll see more hoglets here before the end of the summer!

These little pricklies bring so much joy to myself and my family, that they inspired their own collection of hedgehog jewellery pieces- each piece is hand sawn and crafted in sterling silver by myself in my workshop- where I have a perfect view of Hedgehog HQ from my windows! A percentage of each sale goes to the wildlife hospital too, to help fund their work! You can find my collection of hedgehog pieces HERE.

You can also support South Essex Wildlife Hospital with a donation HERE, and read about their wonderful work- they really are heroes!

I hope you’ve enjoyed hearing a little about our hogs- if you have any questions, please do feel free to get in touch!

Much Love,

Kirsty Xx