Hedgie Fun

As i'm sitting here, on this brisk morning, holding a slightly overchilled hedgie warming her in my lap, i'm strongly aware that i took pics and video of hedgies months ago to post a blog and never posted it!

These are my hedgies. The one staring at you is Gidget, she's a cinnocot color, maybe even apricot colored. The black and white snowflake pinto one giving us the butt, is Gypsy.
Both are females and were adopted from the Hedgehog Welfare Society, through the Rescue in Waldorf, Maryland. It was about an hour or 2 drive down to get these girls but it has been amazing.

I was only going to get one hedgehog, I never dreamed of getting 2. I settled on Gidget, she was so small, she was very underweight, and a little shy but very lovable. My best friend went with me that day to help me pick one out, and she absolutely fell in love with Gypsy, she was the friendliest, most active hedgie i've ever seen. To this day she's not capable of curling into a ball. She can puff out her quills just fine, but she can not ball up.

So since they are both female, and had previously been housed together, we ventured to get both. Both i believe are texas tumbleweeds. One was born in texas, and the other was born after her mother was rescued in texas. read this horrific story to see where my hedgies came from.

I adopted them both in June 2010.

In their playpen you can see that the favorite toy is the tube. That's right all you newbie hedgehog owners, the best toy you can give them is a toilet paper tub.  Gidget is napping after what can only be described as hedgies playing star wars.

Since they are rescues, they are special needs, like any puppy you get at the pound that was mistreated, or just dropped off by its owner and is mistrusting. Both of these girls were underweight and having trouble with eating.

As it turns out, Gypsy is just a picky eater. I switched to babycat immediately since it's higher in fat content to bulk up the hedgies. Gypsy immediately gained weight and has been fine ever since. Maybe even borderline plump.

Gidget however, has been a little more difficult. She was eating the babycat okay, but wasn't gaining as fast. I supplemented her diet with meal worms and she quickly gained. If i didn't give her meal worms for a few days she just as quickly lost it. She doesn't hold on to her body weight so i have to feed her a high fat diet, which worries me since hedgies are prone to fatty liver.
Gidget is missing most of her teeth. She has a few in the front and a few on her right side. Her left side has no teeth. She tries her hardest to eat. I soak her baby cat to make it soft and she loves it. She also has no problems crunching down even a super worm (which can be dangerous if feed to a hedgie wrongly, so be responsible!)

I had to buy a ceramic heat bulb to put over their cage because gidget gets so chilly so easily. While gypsy woke me up several times last night beating things with her tube, and running on the wheel, gypsy didn't move. Which is why she's sitting here with me warming up.

Here is a video i took of them one day while they were in their playpen. if it looks like the video is frozen or not playing, look again... it's still playing.