We hope you enjoyed the mini heat wave as much as did we did as well as the first of the autumn colours coming out towards to the end of week. It’s not just the trees that are getting ready for the chilly weather, our hedgehog friends, two of whom were spotted in Belper and Matlock, will be starting their final preparations for hibernation.

Hedgehogs start their hibernation in October or November depending on the weather!  Whilst hibernating hedgehogs will save energy by lowering their metabolic rate and body temperature. To get ready for hibernation hedgehogs need to build up their reserves by eating lots of food, which mainly consists of beetles, earthworms and caterpillars, all of which are common garden invertebrates.

If you want to help hedgehogs in your garden you can build a hedgehog highway, avoid the use of pesticides, make your water in your garden safe, provide nesting sites and grow a variety of plants to attract a variety of insects for hedgehogs to eat. Your can also help to keep your hedgehog visitors safe by checking for them before strimming, mowing and lighting bonfires as well as keeping items they might get entangled in our of their way and making sure they can get out of any water they could get into.

If you want to help hedgehogs in your garden see the link to the Get Creative For Hedgehogs This Autumn booklet The Wildlife Trusts helped put together below.

Get Creative For Hedgehogs This Autumn booklet: https://www.wildaboutgardens.org.uk/sites/default/files/2021-05/16597%20WAG%20-%20Hedgehog%2016pp%20Booklet%20AW_0.pdf

As more leaves start to turn we are looking forward to reading about your wildlife sightings across Derbyshire. To submit your own sighting and be featured in a future blog go to www.derbyshirewildlifetrust.org.uk/wildlife/record-sighting.

Thank you to Rebekah Johnson, Julie Brown and Dani Smith for submitting their wildlife sightings.