FURTHERMORE
By Gerry Moran
I buried the hedgehog last week. A sad affair. As all burials are. The hedgehog who I’ve been feeding throughout the winter waddled into my carport a few days back, curled quietly into a ball, and remained there until its demise some days later.
A strange place I thought for the hedgehog to encamp and in broad daylight! I kept a close eye on it throughout that first day and the next. And, although it was still and motionless, it was breathing and nibbled at some of the cat food (the usual fare I’d leave out when it came visiting at night). But I wasn’t happy with the set-up, wasn’t happy at all.
The hedgehog had no business curling up in my carport when it should be out under the beech hedge in my back garden foraging for insects and snails and what have you. And then I wondered if it was hibernating! In the middle of spring! Which I quickly ruled out as it didn’t even hibernate in winter! And I wasn’t one bit happy that ‘my’ (if I may call it that) hedgehog was snuffling about, calling for food in the depths of winter. Okay, so it wasn’t a harsh winter but still I couldn’t help thinking: you should be curled up in a ball, fast asleep, in some sheltered foliage to see the winter out.
Nor was I impressed when I came upon it a while back in the middle of my back garden, in the middle of the afternoon, with two noisy magpies paying it way too much attention. I quickly put the run on the magpies, gave the hedgehog a pouch of cat food, which it partially ate, and that was the last I saw of it until its arrival in my carport; its final port of call on this planet.
I considered moving it from the carport to the shelter of our beech hedge but didn’t as I reckoned it chose this particular spot because it is difficult for preying animals to get at it and also because it knew that there was food available here.
And then I got to wondering if this could be the hedgehog I’ve been feeding for years? I mean how does one tell one hedgehog from another? If it was the same hedgehog I like to think that it died peacefully of old age. And if there is a Hedgehog Heaven I know it’s happy scuttling and scurrying about up there.
As it happened Ger Cody of Lake Productions (and belated congratulations to all on the recent, wonderful production of Da) posted the following regarding hedgehogs on Facebook: “If you see me in your garden I appreciate food (unsalted raw meat such as minced meat) I also love cat food (but not fish) and I need water. Please don’t give me milk which would cause stomach problems and I could die. Please don’t use insecticides or traps. I’m inoffensive and help in your garden as I feed on insects that attack your veggies. My species is disappearing, (so) please help us stay alive.”
Well, no milk was ever given to ‘my’ hedgehog and for sure we don’t use insecticides or traps.
Rest in peace little fella.
Ubuntu
And this, which I absolutely love, from Ger Cody’s Facebook page also (a treasure trove of historic anecdotes, poems, paintings and wisdom; thank you, Ger): “An anthropologist proposed a game to children in an African tribe. He placed a basket of fruit near a tree and told the children whoever got to the basket first would win the fruit. When he told them to run they all held each other’s hands and ran together, then they sat together to enjoy the fruit. When they were asked why they ran together like that when one could have had all the fruit to oneself, they said: ‘Ubuntu. How can one of us be happy when all the others are sad?’
“’Ubuntu’ in their civilisation means: ‘I am, because we are.’ That tribe, the anthropologist reckoned knew the secret of happiness, something that has been lost to so many societies that consider themselves civilised.”
