Kent mum has 120 hedgehogs in her garden

A mum who runs Thorne Hedgehog Rescue in Pluckley, near Ashford, say she needs0 more space to meet demand

Transcript

00:00One day I found a hedgehog in my garden and here I am now.

00:04I couldn't find a rescue very close by and when I did I offered to help with

00:09five or six of theirs and it soon became apparent the desperate need for rescue

00:14spaces for hedgehogs in Kent so we've just grown from there.

00:16Obviously the amount of hedgehogs that we can take in, we are always going to be

00:22limited by one, the volunteers we have, well firstly the space we have, then the

00:27volunteers we have to ensure that we can do the care standards and then of

00:30course money always comes into it. We pay our own vet costs, we pay for our own

00:35medications, all the food. We have fantastic supporters that do donate

00:40regularly but as we grow costs increase and those costs themselves are

00:46increasing. The situation we have at the minute with issues with vets is my

00:50current one is leaving, we are using any vet available but overnight in some

00:55cases costs have tripled which obviously then impacts whether we can

01:00take in more hedgehogs that need it, whether we can, you know, we have to make

01:03sure we can ensure the welfare standards that we've already got here

01:07and that unfortunately relies on money. Every hedgehog that comes here is very

01:12poorly, very sick, you know, not all can make it and that's just part of

01:16the job. The struggle for me is having to say no, knowing there's a list of

01:20newborns and I haven't got the space or the money or the resources to be able to

01:25take them in and with so few other spaces available and me being one of the

01:28largest and often when other rescues are full and the last resort meets I know

01:34what is going to happen to them if I say no. So that's the biggest struggle for me

01:38always worrying that I'm going to have to say no to the next one. Ultimately I

01:42have a dream that I will be able to buy some land, fundraise for some

01:48land, have a great big hedgehog hospital, have the secure fields I need for

01:52disabled ones within that with community gardens and I have it as a

01:55people and hedgehog space. Just keep building to meet the demand that we come

02:01across and be able to have the resources and the space and the

02:05volunteers and all the associated things to do that.