Hey, let's look out for them - they're fantastic little creatures...:)
From the The Telegraph:
"After a long, dark winter gardeners are finally taking advantage of the unseasonably warm weather to dust off their power tools and do some spring pruning.
But while mowers and strimmers are quick and efficient at keeping unruly edges looking neat and tidy, they are playing havoc with the UK’s hedgehog population.
This weekend’s warm weather, while welcomed by many, could prove fatal for the hedgehogs who are waking early from hibernation to go out in search of food in longer grass and around garden borders.
This weekend, St Tiggywinkles Wildlife Hospital, in Haddnham, Bucks, said it had treated three hedgehogs injured by a strimmer. Two of the prickly mammals suffered head injuries and the third was found with a “deep cut”.
A spokesman for the animal hospital said: “Now the weather is getting better we are seeing an increase in animals being accidentally injured when people are gardening.
"“Please do carefully check before cutting long grass and plants as hedgehogs and other small animals will likely be hiding there."
More here.............
Replies
That's scary. I'm already mindful of frogs and toads. This is the downside of our modern,labour saving tools.
I do admit to seeing a hedgehog fly across a lawn once when I was strimming and the line picked it up. It did seem fine and scurried off, I think I just skimmed it's back. But when out working there's no way you can go along every area you plan to strim and properly check it for them.
Rather than giving a sensible cut and mulching the cuttings back in he literally shaved the grass off, presumably thinking this would save a cut in a week or so, then took all the waste to the bottom of the garden and piled it up in a heap to become a mound of rotting silage.
The immediate victims of this garden care regime was a couple of slow worms, one was hacked to death and the other had lost its habitat due to the scorched earth gardening technique.
It isn't particularly the tools, it is what the user decides to do with them and when.
There were raised eyebrows two days ago when I said it was inappropriate that a hedge was being cut and it should be left until the end of the summer as it was probably disturbing nesting birds, but then people probably think that my own garden needs a severe trim, but normally each year we have nesting wrens, robins, blue tits, house sparrows, blackbirds and pigeons.
Andy
Agree Andrew, a bit of care and attention can go a long way. But also take Dan's point, it's just not always possible to check every square inch of a job.
The example I gave with the slow worms had grass that was reduced from around 150-200 mm to the lowest setting on the guys mower that took the soil off on uneven parts of the lawn. Obviously any life form didn't stand a chance. Had he took it down to around 50 mm the slow worms would have had a chance to duck and keep their heads down.
Is it actually people's expectation that vegetation will be raved to the ground leaving no hiding places for wildlife that is actually the problem?
Maybe if you are strimming out the bottom of a overgrown hedge a handy Jack Russel may be of use as a hedgehog locator!
But there's more to it than wildlife. We don't garden for wildlife, we garden for humans and cater to their wants.
Wilfully hurting animals isn't an option, but taking thorough measures to check and prevent is simply not cost-effective and we'd be earning a lot less if we did that.
...but what a nicer place it would be especially if we educate our clients and display concern.
You won't see a agricultural contractor cutting a farm hedge this time of the year, because the farm would lose its payments for stewardship of the countryside. But people still think they can have their garden hedge cut or removed at any time of the year.
People know wildlife is protected by law, but it then comes as a surprise when the planners step in and stop them extending their home until they have spent a lot of money on protecting the wildlife that surrounds them. It comas a bigger surprise to some when they then get prosecuted.
Even the humble hedgehog has some legal protection as do some of the plants that may be cut down with a strimmer, so it is not only the sprayer that needs using with care.
Andy
Love this initiative by the guys at ISS landscaping - placed on all their mowing etc gear....
Good to see....
-
1
-
2
of 2 Next