The hedgehog in British culture

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If you grew up on the Beatrix Potter books, you’ll have the hedgehog firmly implanted in your mind as a much-loved part of British culture. 

How do I know that? I don’t, but if you say something authoritatively enough and if it’s not too improbable, you can generally get away with it. 

In fact, these days, even if it’s outright impossible but you’re leading a political party–

Yeah. It’s pretty grim out there. Don’t forget to demonstrate, write to any government representative you can, and vote first chance you get. To the extent that it’s safe, talk to your friends and neighbors about what’s happening in the world, because that’s part of the national conversation and you can’t know in advance what will make a difference. Within the limits of sanity, do whatever else you can think of. Short of assassination and its friends and relatives, of course. Whatever you think of its morality, assassination tends to be counterproductive.

Marginally relevant photo: I don’t have a photo of a hedgehog and draw the line at stealing someone else’s. So in the absence of a hedgehog, here’s a hedge. It’s that scratchy looking thing running along the bottom of the photo. Can’t quite make it out? That’s okay. Just trust me on this.

 

In the meantime, fuck it, let’s talk about hedgehogs: The hedgehog in the Beatrix Potter books is Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle, a washerwoman who–

Oh, go read the books. I haven’t, which means I’d be wise not to give you a plot summary. She was cute. That’s all we need to know for now.

 

Useless bits of information

Hedgehogs are about 8 to 12 inches long and have spines that can pierce human skin. The spines can carry bacteria and other fun stuff, so although they’re not barbed like porcupine spines they still deliver an effective stay-away message. 

However well they’re armed, though, if you’re inclined to see hedgehogs as cute, thye’re cute. If you’re not inclined– Hey, eye of the beholder and all that. I’ve known someone to mistake one, at a quick glance, for a slow-moving, lumpy rat. 

Hedgehogs are endangered in Britain. They’re slow and dark and nocturnal, which leads drivers to run them over regularly. And this human habit of dividing otherwise fruitful (from a hedgehog’s point of view) land into fenced spaces is hard on them. Hedges are great–they forage around them happily, but hedgehogs are wingless and ladderless and walls defeat them. They can travel 2 kilometers in a night to feed, and they need to. 

In response, some people make holes at the base of their fences for hedgehogs to lumber through. One neighbor not only made a hole, she labeled it “hedgehog hole.” I’m sure that’s avoided all sorts of confusion over the years. 

Other people set out water and pet food for them, I’ve heard neighbors talk about hedgehog sightings. Some talk possessively about the hedgehogs that visit their patch of ground; they don’t just see a hedgehog, they have one. 

But fences aren’t the only reason hedgehogs are endangered.

 

Back in the good old days

The middle ages presented the hedgehog with a whole different set of challenges. Remember what I said about cuteness being in the eye of the beholder? Well, in the medieval era, people could look at a hedgehog and see a witch in disguise, because who wouldn’t want to lumber around the village at night and eat slugs? 

Sorry, that was me filtering information through a modern mind. Witches turned themselves into hedgehogs because that’s what witches did. And hedgehogs snuck into fields and stole milk from the cows’ udders. Given how little milk would fit inside a hedgehog, it’s a reminder of how close medieval people lived to hunger and outright famine. 

Hedgehogs are and were lactose intolerant, so if they’re going to steal something you’d expect milk to be low on the list, but never mind. Filter. Modern mind. Sorry, I can’t seem to stop doing that. 

Hedgehogs also stole fruit, and at least one medieval illustration shows a hedgehog carrying an apple by skewering it on its spines. The picture doesn’t include a set of directions for how to skewer the apple in the absence of hands because Ikea hadn’t been invented yet, so we’ll have to work that one out ourselves. 

Setting the witchcraft business aside, since that’s gone out of fashion, although I can’t promise that it’ll stay that way, we’re left with an animal that shares your habitat and is eating (or that you believe is eating) food you count on to feed your family. Humans have been wrestling with that scenario since we started eating, and it doesn’t bring out the sweetness in our nature.

In England, the Preservation of Grain Act of 1532 listed hedgehogs as vermin, along with a host of other animals. Parishes had to pay a bounty of 3 pence for each dead hedgehog someone brought in, and each parish had to meet a quota and could be fined if they didn’t. 

What was 3 pence worth? A 1532 pound was the equivalent of £734 today. There were 240 pence in a pound. Divide that by something, multiply the result by 3, consider the futility of human endeavor, make a cup of tea and sip it slowly while you remember those word problems in math class: If a train traveling east at 70 mph leaves Chicago at 8:14 p.m. and one leaving Hartford, Connecticut at the same time travels west at 48 mph, why are no hedgehogs native to the North American continent?  

You really don’t want me to calculate that for you, even if you think you do. Three pence was more than enough to provide an incentive to kill hedgehogs, and they remained on the vermin list for centuries.

Between 1660 and 1800, an estimated half a million hedgehogs were killed, which provides a hint to how they became endangered. Even after the act was repealed, people kept killing hedgehogs, especially on estates that were managed for hunting and shooting, because they’ll eat the eggs of ground-nesting birds, which had to be preserved so humans could come along and kill them. Hedgehogs also got–and continue to get–killed in traps set for foxes and badgers. 

 

But back to how cute they are

In 2016, having done no campaigning whatsoever, hedgehogs were voted the country’s favorite animal. Did they care? Probably no more than they care about the lettering on our local hedgehog hole, but that kind of sentimental attachment does keep local governments from offering a bounty for their spiny hides.

27 thoughts on “The hedgehog in British culture”

  2. We’ve had a hedgehog feeding station in our garden for a good few years now. I’ve also had a trail camera to record their visitations. When we started out we’d have 4 or 5 different ones every night, but we only get 1 or 2 now, so they’ve definitely dwindled.

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  4. Beguiling creatures, in spite of the spines. I once went on holiday and they had a few hedgehogs in the grounds. We went for a stroll after dark and the noise was quite noticeable. Obvious where the ‘hog’ comes from!
    I can’t vouch for the truth of this but travellers are said to have eaten them, apparently baking them in hot ashes, after encasing them in mud so the spikes can be easily removed. Seems a lot of trouble for small reward but in the past life could be a lot more challenging…
    Jeannie

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    • I’m working from memory, and mine’s more fallible than most people’s, but didn’t the Romans eat them as well?

      No, sorry, that was dormice–another cute critter people don’t tend to eat these days.

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  5. Beatrix Potter undoubtedly did more than anyone to turn hedgehogs from vermin into adorable relics of a quaint (and pretty much fictional) rural past, and her timing was impeccable: according to Mr. Google, by 1901, industrialisation and the decline of agriculture had driven 80% of the populations of England and Wales into urban areas, compared to just 9% in 1800. (” ‘Edge’ogs? Wot are those, mate? Never seen one in Manchester!”)

    As Joni Mitchell pointed out, “You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone.” People have this weird way of romantising what they’ve recently destroyed, and Potter was a shining example, not just with her books but in her efforts at conservation in the Lake District, whose landscapes she passionately adored. On the plus side: her acquisitions of Lake District hill farms formed the kernel of what became the Lake District National Park. On the not-so-plus side, what she was so keen on preserving was a landscape which had been devastated by hundreds of years of sheep farming. There’s an ongoing controversy about this: today’s “conservationist” proponents of “rewilding” would like to reforest it, while their more traditional foes, including Unesco, wax eloquent about preserving a “cultural landscape” shaped by sheep farming, in spite or perhaps because of the fact that the latter is now economically unsustainable as well as environmentally ruinous.

    Conservationists call for Lake District to lose Unesco world heritage status
    Campaigners say designation promotes unsustainable sheep farming at expense of nature recovery and local communities
    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jun/07/conservationists-call-for-lake-district-to-lose-unesco-world-heritage-status

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    • In spite of living in the country for 20 years, I’m basically a city girl with very little knowledge to bring to the conversation beyond the understanding that, yes, we sure as hell do romanticize what we destroy. Thanks for an interesting comment.

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  6. Thank you for this interesting distraction from contemporary life in America. I have always been fond of hedgehogs. As a child, I once nursed an adolescent hedgehog with a gimpy leg back to full strength under the supervision of my Granddad. We named him Spike because we had zero originality but we did gather slugs and worms for him to dine on and made him a cozy bed out of dried leaves. I really hope that conservation efforts are successful in helping the hedgehog population recover.

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  7. It’s an indication of how rare they’re becoming, we rarely see them having come to grief on the roads. Once caught on in my kitchen helping itself to the cat’s food. The cat looked on, speechless. You need stout gloves when handling for sure. Mrs Tiggy Winkle is one of my favourites.

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  8. We had two African pygmy hedgehogs (not at the same time). About half the size and just as cute as the British ones. I kept forgetting to mention the difference when I wrote about them. Several British readers wanted to try adopting the wildlife. I did not hear how that turned out

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  9. I have looked on hedgehogs from afar with pleasure, and am even happier to learn all this additional history of their lives. Interesting that they were burned as witches – like cats.

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  10. I remember a nice receipt for hedgehog in clay. It is put in clay, a clay ball is formed, put that thing in the embers for some hours. Hours later you crack the clay open, the stingy part stays in the clay, the rest is (hopefully) cooked. Bon appétit !

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  12. I expect you to immediately lead the charge in creating a British Hedgehog Defense fund! There should be a percentage of environmental restoration fund for road maintenance that goes towards making travel tunnels for hedgehogs. In my state, every new building must pay 1% towards the Arts fund because we’re not thrilled about having yet another boring building constructed.

    We’re trying to save our endangered salmon here, so we’re uncovering creeks that had asphalt roads slapped on top of them, how rude! We’re putting in large culverts for fish to pass through and adding more shade to the creeks and riversides to hold the sediment in place and keep the water from getting too hot..

    I think a British org could advocate for hedgehog tunnels under the roads with habitat that encourages the hedgehogs to use them. If the people really do love the hedgehogs, they can prove it and give some monies to the defense fund!

    When it comes to Beatrix Potter, I think of Peter Cottontail and a picture of the badger drinking tea. I will go find an image of Ms. Tiggy-Winkle now. I always enjoy your posts! Thank you!

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    • I don’t know if hedgehogs would use tunnels to pass under roads. I know they like piles of branches and twigs, or piles of leaves, but tunnels? Not sure. The experts advise people with fenced yards to create hedgehog holes at the base to allow them to pass through, and they tell people to set out shallow pans of water and food. I expect if tunnels would work, they’d already be suggesting it. Maybe we need Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle to put aside her laundry and get a tiny stop sign so she can hold up traffic when one of her fellow hedgehogs wants to cross the road.

      Okay, not practical. I know. It’d be too small for a driver to see, even at a moderate 30 mph. Back to the drawing board.

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