Hedgehogs for Hampstead Heath

As you may have seen from a recent blog, we launched our Hedgehog Friendly Heath Project in May and so we wanted to update you on how things are going with the project.

It’s been an incredibly busy first few months for the project, working with our amazing community partners, resident groups and green spaces teams to focus attention and resources on conserving our hedgehog population.

We are currently running a Crowdfunder campaign as part of the Save Our Wild Isles Community Fund - Hedgehogs for Hampstead Heath. Find out more by watching our video below - the campaign is running until the 12th October and during this time for every £1 we raise, Aviva will be giving us £2 to support our hedgehog projects.  We are also offering Rewards in return for your donations, which includes a Hedgehog Highway Sign, Hedgehog Bag and Hedgehog House Adoption.

The funds we raise will be used to continue the project, creating resources, completing practical conservation, night time surveys and work further with local residents and schools. We want to say a massive thank you to everyone who has donated so far. We have already raised 80% of our target and still have 27 days to go!

We’ve been carrying out various hedgehog surveys and monitoring, before hedgehogs go into hibernation.

Mid-august, we carried out a Hedgehog survey workshop with some of our volunteers in Golders Hill Park. From previous surveys, Golders Hill Park has been identified as a hot spot for our Hedgehogs on the Heath and we wanted to survey the area to see if they are still present here. During our workshop, our volunteers learned about the different hedgehog surveying techniques. This includes footprint tunnels, camera trapping and spotlighting. You can find more about these techniques and guidance from the People’s Trust of Endangered Species (PTES)

We are pleased to report we had some hedgehog footprints, which means hedgehogs are still present in the park. We want to ensure the hedgehogs continue to thrive on the Heath.

Volunteers setting up Hedgehog Footprint Tunnels

Hedgehog footprints

At the end of August, we were out with other wildlife organisations and community groups, helping to survey the Heath Extension and working with these groups to find out more about the hedgehog population north of the Heath.

This month, we have been carefully checking our Hedgehog houses on the Heath. We are doing this before Hibernation starts to minimise any disturbance. We will then check back in the Spring to monitor any signs of use.

Did you know you can adopt one of our hedgehog houses ?

We will install, monitor, and provide updates for you. To find out more, click here.

We have also been looking into other ways we can monitor hedgehogs on the Heath. Garden Wildlife Heath (GWH), a project which aims to monitor the health of, and identify disease threats to, British wildlife, are asking members of the public to with report any sick or dead hedgehog and other wildlife they see in their gardens. We will be assisting GWH, by reporting any sick or dead hedgehog that is found on the Heath. To find out more about the project, please click here.

If you see a sick, injured or dead hedgehog on the Heath, please let us know.

Another part of our project is connectivity. We have identified four potential corridors off the Heath - North, South, East and West Corridors. We have recently been focusing on the East Corridor, which would go from the Heath to Waterlow Park. There have been no recent hedgehog sightings in Waterlow Park or Highgate Cemetery. We would like to see if our hedgehog population could spread into these area. Therefore, we have organised a couple of walkarounds with local organisations, including the Heath and Hampstead Society, Growing Green, Friends of Waterlow Park and Fitzroy Park Residents Association, to identify the potential barriers. Our next steps will be discussing interventions to overcome some of these barriers.  

We will be sharing more on this in our next Hedgehog Friendly Heath update.