Winter and hedgehogs

As winter approaches, Mother Nature retreats, with wonderful order and efficiency, into her shell. In the flower garden the annuals have set their seed for the next generation to be able to emerge and take over from this year's dying crop. The great majority of insects have laid their eggs or crept under cover for the winter to ensure the survival of their species for another year. As you give your garden its end-of-year tidy, look out for ways of boosting their choice of over-wintering sites. Don't compost all your sweet-corn husks; leave a few secured in a wall, hedge or tree where their cells will provide great shelter for bees, ladybirds and the like. Sun flower stalks cut into 15 inch lengths and bound together for strength, will be five star accommodation for a myriad of tiny creatures. Be creative and see what you can design – get the children involved!

Frogs and toads bury themselves down into the vegetation to avoid the worst pf the winter's blast. With the increasing chilliness of October evenings, bats will have found a roosting site where they can huddle together for warmth; they might hang in hollow trees, or in the dim recesses of a barn or loft space, or even in your nest box if you have been far-sighted enough to provide one. At Cabragh Wetlands our pipistrelle bats are snoozing happily, but will still be tempted out on unseasonably mild evenings, especially as the moths they feed on may also be on the wing. Squirrels have been busy collecting and storing caches of nuts as winter food, and as it gets colder they will spend more and more time in their nest, or 'drey', popping out every now and then to locate one of their many larders and top up on their favourite nourishment.

But at this time of year do make an effort to remember the hedgehogs. They are one your garden's best friends, an avid consumer of excess slugs and snails, and you could construct a great shelter for them in a few seconds, with a few blocks or timber for walls and some planking for a roof, weighed down with a few stones. Tuck it under a hedge in a quiet corner, preferably away from the road and pop in a few handfuls of warm straw or hay. Last winter was unseasonably warm and many hedgehogs mistimed their breeding season, producing helpless, hairless young too early in the year, and many were killed by returning frosts and icy winds.

Halloween is another great danger for the hedgehogs, who love to overwinter in the depths of a heap of logs. They can retire at a moment's notice to the safety and warmth of a cosy woodpile. Are you planning a Halloween bonfire? Then please take the time to dismantle the wood before you set it alight, and give that most delightful of creatures a fair chance to get out and find himself alternative winter quarters.