Mammals of Doddington Wood

Hedgehogs

Hedgehogs are Britain’s only spiky mammal. An adult will have roughly 6000 spines that are made of keratin (like our hair and nails). The spines are creamy brown in colour.
Hedgehogs have four legs and they can run quite fast. They have a small tail.
If a hedgehog feels threatened it will curl into a ball shape until the danger has passed.
Hedgehogs are nocturnal (sleep during the day). They tend to come out at night. Due to this they have poor eyesight and rely on their sense of smell and hearing.
Hedgehogs like to eat worms, slugs, beetles, earwigs etc. They are sometimes called the gardeners friend due to this.
Wild hedgehogs live two to five years.
Baby hedgehogs are called hoglets.
You can help hedgehogs if you have a garden by leaving out water, calcium worms and dry kitten food. You can make or cut a hole in your fence to make it easy for hedgehogs to visit your garden. This is often called a hedgehog highway as it allows hedgehogs to come and go in your garden. Please do not feed hedgehogs milk, as it makes them poorly as they are lactose intolerant.

Bats are nocturnal (sleep during day) mammals that can be seen on warm summer evenings. They fly 2 to 10 metres above the ground searching for food that they eat mid flight.
Cramlington has common pipistrelle bats. They weigh five grams which is roughly the same as a 20 pence coin. Their wingspan is 20 to 30 cms. They are dark brown in colour. A single pipistrelle bat can eat up to 3000 small insects in one night. They eat small flies and midges.
Bats like to live in roofs/eves and tree holes or bat boxes.
Bats hibernate during the winter.
Baby bats are called pups.
Bats live for four to five years.
Seven Oaks Park in Cramlington has pipistrelle bats and you can see them flying on warm summer evenings. If you have a garden you can sometimes see bats flying on warm summer evenings chasing flies.