Eating outside at dusk, enjoying the warmth of the evening, we heard a rustling coming from low down in our hedge. Too loud to be a blackbird, too quiet to be anything huge. we held our breath in hope. The rustling moved closer towards where we were sitting. “There it is,” we whispered to each other in delight as a snuffling nose, followed by a round body of prickles emerged out of the garden border onto our grass. The hedgehog, which may have been Mr rather than Mrs Tiggywinkle – it was the stories of Mrs Tiggywinkle that I read as a child and so I continue to think of all hedgehogs as female – snuffled towards us on her (his) little short legs.

Snuffling is the only term possible to use for this creature’s movements, for without doubt it is lead by its nose. Terribly short sighted, it was unaware of us and took no notice even when we briefly turned on a torch to see it better. Encouraged by this, Ian took a photo.

The hedgehog’s interest continued to be focussed on finding edibles under our bird feeder. After around ten minutes, it lifted up its body on its four short legs and scuttled across the lawn. Guess what? It followed the fence along that side of the garden and made its way through the hedgehog hole we had cut for its use. Bingo!

For four consecutive nights now, this lovely little wild mammal has followed the same pattern, appearing nearly on the dot of 7.45pm, finding what it can in our garden, then moving on to our neighbours. I was going to headline this post saying we had had ‘a prickly evening visitor’. Evening would be correct, prickly certainly so. But not a visitor. We are as much visitors on this creature’s land as it is on ours. Just as Beatrix Potter named the hedgehog in her story ‘Mrs Tiggywinkle’, and so I think of all hedgehogs as Mrs, so too if I call this creature a ‘visitor’ I continue the myth that this land is ours, when I believe it belongs to all who in any way live, or move across, on, under or over it.

Now is a great time to see hedgehogs as they feed up ready for winter hibernation. Leave dead leaves under hedges; when pruning, put some piles in corners to encourage insects, and you increase your chances of being visited. Put a saucer of water out. You can buy hedgehog food. (Never put out milk, it is bad for them.) Cut a hole in the bottom of your fence, so their world stays as large as they need. Then go out at dusk and listen for rustlings. I’d love to know if you see one.

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