Hedgehog Awareness Week 2024: How to help our spiky friends

Video caption, Top tips for looking after a hedgehog

It's Hedgehog Awareness Week from 5 - 11 May.

This year's theme is 'Welcome Wildlife' and we've got some great tips and advice on how to can help them.

This year organisers are encouraging people to create a space for wildlife in their gardens or green spaces and want places, such as schools, to do the same.

Why have hedgehog numbers been in decline?

Video caption, Meet the girls who rescue hedgehogs

Experts say there are a lot of reasons.

Firstly, their habitat has shrunk over the decades as more buildings and houses are built, so hedgehogs can't wander as freely across the landscape as they used to.

Pesticides and herbicides in our gardens and on farmland, which are deadly to hedgehogs, have also had a big impact on the animals' survival.

Hedgehogs numbers are also falling because many are killed on our increasingly busy roads.

Video caption, The kids helping hedgehogs

How can you help hedgehogs?

The Warwickshire Wildlife Trust recommend things like leaving out cat food and water for hedgehogs in your garden.

They also say it's a good idea to make a small (hedgehog-sized) hole in your fence, so they can move between habitats (but make sure you have permission and help from an adult first).

Having a log pile or bug hotel in your garden is another way you can help hedgehogs. The animals feast on insects so if there's an area where there are lots around they'll have more food.