One of the simplest and most effective ways to improve life for hedgehogs is to enable them to roam between gardens. They need to be able to range over a mile each night to find food and to meet other hedgehogs for breeding.  All too often, hard fencing blocks their way, reducing their foraging opportunities and isolating them.

Help is at hand though: a Shropshire company, Shropshire Fencing Supplies, produces gravel boards – the concrete base on which wooden fence panels sit – with a ready-made hole in them that is perfect for hedgehogs.  They cost exactly the same as gravel boards without holes in them, so the company expected demand to be high.  Sadly, they have so far sold only five.

‘We must make every effort to help hedgehogs,’ says Kathryn.  ‘People love them but not enough of us are making the changes to their habitat that will make a difference to their chances of survival. If we want to keep them in our lives that needs to change.’