Brown-breasted hedgehog

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Brown-breasted hedgehog
Young brown-breasted hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus)

Young brown-breasted hedgehog ( Erinaceus europaeus )

Systematics
Superordinate : Laurasiatheria
Order : Insect eater (Eulipotyphla)
Family : Hedgehog (Erinaceidae)
Subfamily : Hedgehog (Erinaceinae)
Genre : Small ear hedgehog ( Erinaceus )
Type : Brown-breasted hedgehog
Scientific name
Erinaceus europaeus
Linnaeus , 1758

The brown-breasted hedgehog ( Erinaceus europaeus ), also known as Western European hedgehog or western hedgehog , is a mammal from the hedgehog family (Erinaceidae). Whenever the hedgehog is spoken of as a species in Europe, this species is usually meant as it is distributed over almost the entire European continent. In East-Central and Eastern Europe and in parts of West Asia , however, the also to be Smallear hedgehogs scoring Northern White-breasted Hedgehog , the predominant type. From the protective association German Wild the Hedgehog is the " animal of the year 2009 has been selected".

Appearance

Height and weight

Hedgehog anatomy in longitudinal section

A fully grown two-year-old brown-breasted hedgehog reaches a head-torso length of 22 to 30 centimeters. The tail is about two centimeters long. The body weight of the brown-breasted hedgehog fluctuates depending on the age of the animal and the season. Brown-breasted hedgehogs, which have completed their first year of life, usually weigh between 450 and 700 grams. Brown-breasted hedgehogs, which weigh more than this in late summer, are usually older. They can weigh more than 1,500 grams because they build up fat reserves for the winter months. In spring, however, when the fat reserves have been used up due to hibernation , even older hedgehogs occasionally weigh only 350 grams.

the spikes

Close view of the spines

The most noticeable feature of the brown-breasted hedgehog are the spines that cover the top of the head and back. The number of spines depends on the body size. Young hedgehogs, which are just able to leave the nest on their own, have about 3000 spines. A fully grown hedgehog weighing 600 grams has about 5000 and a very large hedgehog 7500. The spines are modified hairs that are around 20 to 30 millimeters long and one to two millimeters thick. The “lifespan” of a single sting is between twelve and eighteen months before it fails and a new one grows back. The spines are creamy white at the roots and then turn brown. Immediately in front of the white tip of the spine, the color of the spine is darkest. In young hedgehogs and occasionally in older individuals, they are almost black at this point.

So-called "blond" hedgehog

Occasionally there are hedgehogs whose spines do not have the usual brown color. A deviating white or horn-colored sting is usually limited to just one part of the body. There are also hedgehogs whose spines are completely white or horn-colored. These hedgehogs are not albinos because they have the gray-brown fur characteristic of hedgehogs on their face and belly. On the Channel Island of Alderney , hedgehogs, whose spines are conspicuously bright, horn-colored, make up 25 percent of the hedgehog population: Alderney was originally hedgehogless, but in 1966 Harrods' London pet department sold some hedgehogs there. Among these there was obviously at least one specimen with a presumably inherited recessive predisposition for these spines, which are also known as "blond". The few founder animals to which the hedgehog population on Alderney can be traced back helped the spread of this trait.

Albinos also occur in hedgehog populations. Due to a lack of pigment, in addition to creamy white spines, they also have a similar coat, pink skin and red eyes. Since brown-breasted hedgehogs are nocturnal animals, the albinos' increased sensitivity to light has little effect on the fitness of the individual animal. The nocturnal way of life also appears to reduce the negative pressure to which albinos are normally exposed, as albinos are more common among hedgehogs than other animal species.

Other features

Front foot (right) and rear foot (left) of a curled up hedgehog

Brown-breasted hedgehogs have short limbs, with the hind legs slightly longer than the front legs. The feet each end in five toes with claws. The second, third and fourth toes are approximately the same length, the first and fifth are smaller and also have smaller claws. They are sole walkers who put the entire foot surface on when moving.

skull

The head of the brown-breasted hedgehog has a long, flexible snout. You have 36 teeth, the tooth formula is 3 / 2-1 / 1-3 / 2-3 / 3. This means that they have three incisors , one canine , three premolars and three molars per upper half of the jaw, two incisors, one canine, two premolars and three molars per lower half of the jaw. The incisors of the upper jaw are wide apart so that those of the lower jaw fit between them. As with many insectivores, the teeth are strongly developed.

The eyes are round and small, the ears are also small with a length of one centimeter and almost completely hidden in the fur. The sense of sight is poorly developed, but obviously plays only a minor role in foraging for food. Telemetric examinations, in which blind hedgehogs were among the examined hedgehogs, indicated no significant impairments of these animals. Blind hedgehogs have even successfully raised young. When looking for food, brown-chested hedgehogs rely primarily on their sense of smell , with the Jacobson organ also helping them to weather prey or enemies. Hearing is also well developed.

Both sexes have five teats on each side of the body. The male's button-shaped, skin-like penis opening is in the middle of the back of the body, about five centimeters from the anus . The testicles cannot be seen externally. The sexual opening of the female is no more than two centimeters in front of the anus.

voice

Snoring sounds of a sleeping hedgehog

When exploring the area, brown-breasted hedgehogs usually only make quiet sniffing and sneezing noises. This is usually accompanied by a rustling when they move through the undergrowth. Sometimes you can also hear smacking and cracking noises, which indicate that the hedgehog has found something to eat.

A louder cackling can be heard when the solitary hedgehogs meet other conspecifics near feeding places. It turns into hissing and loud puffing when hedgehogs feel threatened. Occasionally a loud and piercing scream or screech is also described for hedgehogs. Hedgehogs only let these screams be heard in great need. Hedgehogs let their voice be heard most persistently and loudest during the mating game. The noises that hedgehogs make are reminiscent of snoring and sawing noises.

distribution

Distribution area in Europe

Brown-breasted hedgehogs inhabit large parts of Western and Central Europe , including the British Isles , the Iberian Peninsula , France , Italy and some Mediterranean islands , Germany , Switzerland and Austria ; in addition, parts of the Baltic states , northern Russia to the Ural Mountains , southern Finland and southern Scandinavia . Observations suggest that in the 20th century its range expanded into Scandinavia. Across eastern Central Europe (from western Poland through the Czech Republic and Austria to the northern Italian , Slovenian and Croatian Adriatic coasts ) there is an approximately 200 km wide area in which the range of the brown- breasted hedgehog overlaps that of the northern white-breasted hedgehog. Another area of ​​overlap between these two species lies in southern Estonia , northern Latvia , the adjoining western tip of northwestern Russia (parts of Pskov Oblast ) and northern central Russia (including Moscow ) to the east .

In New Zealand the way in the late 19th century, was introduced and has increased considerably there.

habitat

Hedgehog tracks in the sodden ground

Hedgehog prefer a richly structured open fields with a varied vegetation of hedges, bushes, ground cover , grasslands, field boundaries with Altgrasbestand or perennials thickets , small woods with dead wood stocks and waste ground . They can also be found on the edges of deciduous forests. They avoid coniferous forests, arable land without trees or bushes and habitats that are too humid such as moors . Bushes and hedges, but also hollow tree trunks and crevices in the rock serve as resting places, sometimes they also move into the abandoned burrows of other mammals. Brown-breasted hedgehogs can be found today mainly in orchards , in natural gardens, parks and cemeteries as well as in the green settlement areas on the outskirts of cities and villages. They were able to at least partially compensate for the loss of their original habitat - namely a richly structured field floor - by increasingly developing human settlement areas as cultural followers .

food

The most important food components

Although the hedgehog is a carnivore (mostly insects), it also
eats windfalls in the fall

The main food of the brown-breasted hedgehog consists mainly of insects, including beetles such as ground beetles , earwigs , caterpillars, as well as millipedes and earthworms . Slugs are not one of his favorite foods, they only make up between one and five percent of the diet. Shell snails are only very rarely eaten by hedgehogs - their teeth make it difficult for them to break open the snail shells. Dew-wet grassland, extensively grazed by cattle, is evidently a particularly productive hunting ground for brown-breasted hedgehogs. They occasionally cover up to a kilometer at night to look for food on such terrain.

The brown-breasted hedgehog also eats mammals such as mice , shrews , voles and moles . These are mostly nest-young, still blind animals that the hedgehog finds on its nocturnal searches. Neither its teeth nor its running speed enable the brown-breasted hedgehog to be a serious predator for the adult animals of these species. Brown-breasted hedgehogs also eat carrion and can therefore occasionally be seen on the remains of the animals mentioned above.

Bird eggs and chicks make up an important part of the diet during the breeding season. Chicken eggs are usually too big for the hedgehog to break. It does, however, capture chicks from the domestic chicken. The eggs of ground-breeding birds such as seagulls , terns , larks , pheasants and partridges as well as pipiters are definitely eaten by it. The hedgehog specialist Pat Morris, however, refers to studies on the breeding success of hunting pheasants, which have shown that far more pheasant nests are destroyed by agricultural machines than are lost to the hedgehog. On some islands where the brown-breasted hedgehog was introduced, the hedgehog actually poses a threat to rare ground-nesters.

In autumn, brown-breasted hedgehogs occasionally eat overripe windfalls - but it only represents an insignificant proportion of their total diet. It is also possible that they are only interested in the insects that abound in windfalls.

Food myths

In the older literature one can still find information that brown-breasted hedgehogs also eat snakes to a large extent. However, the nocturnal hedgehog has little opportunity to even encounter the diurnal snakes. Hedgehogs can actually tolerate a high amount of snake venom in relation to their body size, but snakes do not belong in their normal food spectrum. Hedgehogs only succeed in killing small adders in individual cases. Similar to the mammals mentioned above, however, the hedgehog will eat snake carcasses when it finds them.

Another part of the realm of legend is the claim that hedgehogs store their food supplies on the spines. Although leaves or fruit are sometimes found impaled on its back, the animals do not feed on them. They inadvertently pick up this ballast, for example in their nest, and then do not seem to be very eager to remove it.

Also legendary are reports that hedgehogs drink milk from the teats of lying cows . It is not only questionable whether a cow would tolerate such a thing. A hedgehog's mouth is too small to grasp the teat of an udder . Milk is not a suitable food for hedgehogs and can lead to life-threatening diarrhea.

Way of life

Activity and social behavior

Like all hedgehogs , the brown-breasted hedgehog is a crepuscular and nocturnal loner. During the day the hedgehog sleeps in a nest or cavity lined with leaves or branches in order to search for food at dusk and at night. The brown-breasted hedgehog has two main phases of activity. The first is between 6 p.m. and 9 p.m., the second between midnight and 3 a.m.

The area that a male regularly roams can be up to one square kilometer . Females, on the other hand, use territories that are rarely larger than 0.3 km 2 . Brown-breasted hedgehogs are basically very local. They use several nests made of leaves or grass within their territory, which they visit at irregular intervals. Brown-breasted hedgehogs are solitary animals who avoid contact with conspecifics outside of the mating season. They have no territorial behavior, but have overlapping territories.

Males cover about two to three kilometers during their nocturnal foraging. The nocturnal hiking routes of the females, on the other hand, are somewhat shorter. Telemetric studies have shown that they are also able to cross rivers by swimming. As a rule, however, such rivers represent the boundaries of their territory.

Salivation

Salivation

Brown-breasted hedgehogs can occasionally be seen producing large amounts of frothy saliva through chewing movements and spitting this saliva on their backs under contortions that appear strange to humans. It has not yet been sufficiently clarified what the cause and the consequences of this behavior are. However, it occurs particularly frequently when the animals smell a substance that smells particularly intensely. It is therefore assumed that this process serves to cleanse the taste and smell cells.

The curling up of the hedgehog

Curled up hedgehog

One of the most famous properties of the hedgehog is that they can curl up into a spiked ball. The curling of the body is a complex interplay of numerous muscles, including the caudo-dorsalis muscle , which runs from the caudal vertebrae to the back and erects the spines, and a circular muscle ( sphincter cuculli muscle ), which keeps the animal closed and thus hides the unprotected parts of the body . Each spine is also equipped with a righting muscle ( Musculus arrector pili ), which ensures that the spines are set up rigidly when they contract. Brown-breasted hedgehogs do not completely curl up with every danger, but are initially content with pulling in the head or raising the spiked hood of the head.

Hibernation

The brown-breasted hedgehog hibernates , which can also be interrupted. It is one of the real hibernators and spends around five to six months (from October or November to April) in a protected spherical nest during the food-poor period, with piles of brushwood or leaves serving as winter quarters. All metabolic processes are greatly reduced. The body temperature drops from around 36 degrees to one to eight degrees, the breathing rate is once or twice a minute, the heart rhythm drops to five beats per minute. During hibernation, they lose between 17 and 26 percent of their body weight. To survive hibernation, the animals must have a body weight of at least 500 grams. When the outside temperature is 15 degrees, hibernation ends.

Reproduction

The pairing

Hedgehog carousel at night

The hedgehog mating season begins at the end of April or May and extends until mid-August. Male hedgehogs travel long distances in search of female partners willing to mate. If a male finds a female capable of mating, it circles around this with great perseverance. The female eludes u. U. the attempts at readjustment by the male by turning the side of his body to him with puffing and hissing and repelling the male's advances with upright spines and bumps of the head. The movements of both hedgehogs are so noticeable that they are sometimes referred to as "hedgehog carousel". Such a hedgehog carousel can go on for hours. If another male is added, the female often uses the short fight between the two males to move away from the battlefield.

Despite the spines, the brown-breasted hedgehogs mate in a posture that is conventional for mammals. The male mounts the female from behind. This presses his body flat against the ground and has laid the spines flat. Mating can last for over an hour, interrupted by short breaks. If the male remains close to the female after mating, the female will bite the male shortly before the young are born. As a rule, however, the male looks for other partners willing to mate shortly after mating.

The young animals

Newborn baby boy with eyes closed

After a gestation period of around 35 days, the female gives birth to her offspring between June and September. The month with the highest birth rates is August. In Central Europe, 61 percent of all young hedgehogs are born this month. She uses a large nest, carefully padded with dry grass, old leaves and moss, which she builds about a day before giving birth. Rain-protected shelters such as hollow trees, piles of brushwood, piles of wood or cavities under garden sheds and sheds are usually used as nurseries. The young hedgehogs weigh 12 to 25 grams at birth and have closed eyes and ears. If the mother hedgehog is disturbed during or shortly after the birth, she will leave her litter or even eat it up. Only later does she react to disturbances by carrying the young to another nest.

Composition of hedgehog milk
nutrient Quantity per 100 g
Dry matter 45.2 g
energy 1353 kJ
Crude protein 16 g
Raw fat 25.5 g
Lactose 0.07 g
Calcium 0.41 mg
phosphorus 0.27 mg
magnesium 0.03 mg
sodium 0.09 mg
potassium 0.15 mg
iron 1.79 mg
copper 0.31 mg
zinc 3.02 mg

The suckling period lasts approximately until the sixth week. In the first week you gain about three grams daily, from the third week of life about four grams daily. At the end of the suckling period, young hedgehogs weigh around 200 to 250 grams. Hedgehog milk has a very high dry matter and fat content and a very low milk sugar ( lactose ) content and is therefore most similar to seal milk . The fat consists mainly of long-chain fatty acids with a very high proportion of linoleic acid . The iron and zinc content are also exceptionally high. The high zinc content is probably due to the growth of the spines, which have high levels of this trace element .

Three young animals, one day after their birth

The approximately 100 spines that a newly born hedgehog have are white at birth and embedded in the pink, swollen-looking skin on the back. Even within the first two weeks of life, the young hedgehog grow more and more spines that have the typical hedgehog color with the brown center. From the age of 14 days, the eyes begin to open. From the 21st day of life the milk teeth come through. They are gradually replaced by the permanent set of teeth at two to three months of age. At the age of three and a half weeks, the young leave the nest for the first time and try to find food on their own. They reach sexual maturity at around nine months.

Litter size

In Central Europe, brown-breasted hedgehogs usually have only one litter per year. If the first litter is lost, hedgehogs occasionally have a second litter, which is then born in late summer. However, these young hedgehogs have only a slim chance of surviving the winter months. They usually do not have enough fat reserves to be able to wake up from hibernation. In warmer regions of the distribution area, brown-breasted hedgehogs can raise up to two litters a year. The litter size can vary between two and ten young hedgehogs. On average, four to five young are born. As a rule, a mother hedgehog does not have enough milk to feed a litter larger than five hedgehogs. If the weather is too cold or too dry, so that the hedgehog cannot find enough food, even the nutrition of such an average litter is at risk. The British hedgehog expert Pat Morris estimates that a female hedgehog does not raise more than two, at most three young animals per season.

Life expectancy, predators and diseases

The eagle owl is one of the most important predators of the brown-breasted hedgehog

Predators

Even a complete curl does not completely protect the brown-breasted hedgehog from carnivores. Their natural enemies include predators such as martens and foxes . Because of their strong, long claws, golden eagles and eagle owls are among the few animal species that are able to kill a tightly curled hedgehog. The roof is rolled up with its special muzzle able a curled hedgehog. The eagle owl and badger are therefore the hedgehog's most important predators in Central Europe.

Sick and malnourished hedgehogs often no longer have the energy to curl up tightly. Hungry hedgehogs also look for food during the day. Such already weakened hedgehogs are also preyed by martens, polecats or wild boars and attacked by crows and magpies. They are also occasionally exposed to attacks from domestic dogs.

Diseases

Hedgehog parasitized by numerous ticks

Brown-breasted hedgehogs are very often attacked by parasites . Among the endoparasites lung worm count Crenosoma striatum and hair worms of the genus Capillaria . Lungworms can cause pneumonia caused by parasites, which is further complicated by bacterial colonization. More common tapeworms are Brachylaemus erinacei and Hymenolepis erinacei . Scratchworms can cause severe damage to the intestinal wall and also peritonitis. Coccidia like Isospora rastegaievae are rather rare. Among the ectoparasites , fleas such as the hedgehog flea Archaeopsylla erinacei , ticks ( hedgehog tick and common wood tick ) and other mites such as Caparinia erinacei and Caparinia tripilis are of particular importance. Brown-breasted hedgehogs suffer from parasite infestation the more inadequate their general health is. Poorly nourished hedgehogs can succumb to parasite infestations.

Hedgehogs often develop dermatophytoses or are asymptomatic carriers of dermatophytes . In the case of infectious diseases, in addition to secondary bacterial infections of the lungs, salmonella in particular play an important role. Rabies , on the other hand, is extremely rare.

Life expectancy

There is not yet enough information on how old hedgehogs can get. Hedgehogs living in the wild have been shown to be up to seven years old. In captivity, hedgehogs reached an age of ten years or more. However, very few newborn hedgehogs reach such a high age. Studies have shown that the death rate among young hedgehogs is very high: out of a litter of five young hedgehogs, on average, one hedgehog dies before it can leave the nest for the first time. Out of ten young hedgehogs, only one or two survive the first year of life. Hedgehogs that have already completed their first year of life, on the other hand, have a 50 percent chance of completing their second year.

Duration

There are no comprehensive inventories of hedgehogs for Central Europe. In Germany alone, however, around half a million hedgehogs are killed in traffic every year, which indicates high numbers.

In Germany, however, six out of a total of 16 federal states have classified the hedgehog as an endangered species. In 2017 the Bavarian State Office for the Environment added the hedgehog to the warning list for the red list of endangered species, despite its frequent occurrence.

Hedgehog road traffic victim

In Berlin and Bavaria, citizen research projects are trying to check the hedgehog population.

Man-made dangers represent the greatest threat to the brown-breasted hedgehog. For example, curling up to the prickly ball is a type of behavior that is disadvantageous in connection with road traffic, since car tires can run over hedgehogs that remain immobile on the road.

The increasing scarcity of its habitat due to development and clearing of the fields in order to enable large-scale, industrial land use has resulted in considerable habitat destruction and has made it rare in parts of its distribution area. This habitat destruction also results in island populations that are genetically isolated from the rest of the population. Hedgehogs, for example, may still be found in large numbers in the outer settlement area of ​​a village. If this village is surrounded by busy traffic routes and agricultural areas used in intensive monoculture, there is little or no exchange with neighboring populations. This means that the gene exchange necessary for a healthy and resilient population is missing . Isolated populations are more at risk than others of being wiped out by exogenous factors such as an epidemic outbreak.

In recent years, the population in Vienna has decreased significantly. Therefore, in 2014 in Donaustadt and in autumn 2015 , the municipal garden authority began to leave piles of leaves in other outskirts and to cover them with spruce branches to provide hedgehogs with winter quarters. The side effect of this hedgehog project, which is the largest in terms of area, is an increase in insects and songbirds , such as the wren .

Systematics

Within the hedgehog family , the brown-breasted hedgehog belongs to the subfamily of the prickly hedgehog (Erinaceinae) and there to the genus of the short-eared hedgehog ( Erinaceus ), which in addition to it belongs to three species, the southern ( Erinaceus concolor ) and northern ( Erinaceus roumanicus ) white-breasted hedgehog and the Chinese hedgehog ( Erinaceus amurensis ) includes. The hedgehogs are classified in the order of insectivores (Insectivora), which also includes the shrews (Soricidae) and the moles (Talpidae). The oldest hedgehogs developed in the Oligocene , the first modern hedgehogs from the genus Erinaceus as early as the Middle Miocene . The two species of white-breasted hedgehog or Ostigel, whose distribution area adjoins that of the brown-breasted hedgehog to the east and, in the case of the northern white-breasted hedgehog, overlap with it, used to be regarded as a subspecies of the brown-breasted hedgehog. Both species were summarized as the "European hedgehog". However, this view does not correspond to the current state of science. Rather, it is now certain that the Pleistocene Ice Ages resulted in separate hedgehog populations. France, Spain and Italy, which remained ice-free, were a retreat. The other part of the population was in south-eastern Europe. The separation, which lasted over 700,000 years, resulted in two different species; according to recent studies, the white-breasted hedgehog is divided into two types.

Brown-breasted hedgehog and human

Brown-breasted hedgehog in Upper Paleolithic art

One of the oldest works of art of mankind, hedgehogs from the Vogelherd cave (40,000 years old, Aurignacien), UNESCO World Heritage " Caves and Ice Age Art in the Swabian Jura ", Museum of the University of Tübingen MUT

Hedgehogs were rarely depicted in Upper Paleolithic art in general . During archaeological excavations in the overburden of the Vogelherd cave on the Swabian Alb , a fragmented figure of just under three centimeters was discovered in 2008. It is made of mammoth ivory and possibly represents a hedgehog. The almost five centimeter tall mammoth ivory sculpture comes from the Aurignacia and is part of the UNESCO World Heritage " Caves and Ice Age Art in the Swabian Jura ". The find is exhibited with 15 other finds in the Museum of Ancient Cultures in Hohentübingen Castle .

Use in folk medicine

In folk medicine is used Igel diverse. The spikes were used in old French love spells. Hedgehog ash was used in antiquity as a hair restorer: According to the De medicamentis written by the Roman official Marcellus Empiricus , who worked in Gaul in the early 5th century , the skin (“armor”) and head of a hedgehog were burned and the ashes underneath Added honey applied to the areas affected by hair loss. In a second recipe, Marcellus mentions that only the head of the hedgehog can be burned, whereby the ashes, mixed with the fat from the hedgehog's body, should then be applied for treatment. This should allow hair to grow again even on scarred areas of the skin. In a third recipe, he describes that the hedgehog can also be burned completely, and that its ashes, prepared with bear fat as an ointment, can even heal an already existing baldness. Hedgehog ash was also used against epilepsy , dropsy and bladder weakness as well as horse diseases. Kidney and bladder stones were tried to be expelled with dried hedgehog blood and hedgehog fat was considered a remedy for broken bones and open wounds. If the whole body of a patient / sick person was rubbed with hedgehog fat, this should help against hereditary diseases. Hedgehog or fox lard, spread on a stick, allegedly attracted all the fleas in the household. Hedgehog bile was used as a beautifying agent, hedgehog liver was used as a remedy for kidney diseases and cramps, and hedgehog spleen for spleen diseases.

Hedgehogs as food

Hedgehog meat was used as food in many regions of Europe.

In the fifth century roast hedgehog was occasionally on the menu of the Romans , the same applies to England in the 15th century. In medieval Spain , hedgehog meat was a popular fasting food . This was justified by the fact that hedgehogs would only live on herbs and roots. The fact that the purely vegetarian cattle and sheep were not eaten at the same time during Lent was obviously not perceived as a contradiction. In the culture of the Roma , the hedgehog - here with a particularly symbolic reference - is still part of the diet today.

In Germany, like almost all native wild mammal species, the hedgehog has been specially protected since 1980. Thus, access and possession bans apply, according to which one is not allowed to stalk him and not to catch, kill or injure individual animals and - even dead or in parts - not to own them. There are similar laws in most European countries.

Fairy tales and superstitions

The hedgehog plays an important role in fairy tales and superstition . It has been said to have mythical properties since time immemorial. In the concise dictionary of German superstition, for example, one can read that, according to Megenberg, the hedgehog has two anus openings to let out the feces. In addition, the hedgehog is unchaste with its female because the spines on her back prick him. The female turns on her back in his opinion. Charus is also quoted there, who said that the hedgehog climbs onto vineyards and picks grapes with its spikes. Depending on the interpretation, hedgehogs bring luck or bad luck, the Sinti and Roma considered the hedgehog to be a lucky animal. According to Zahler, however, a hedgehog in the stable causes the "flight", a dreaded udder disease in cows. In Nord- Dithmarschen, however , a dead hedgehog buried in the stable as a construction sacrifice should bring good luck. In Lippe , the hedgehog was seen as a witch beast that balled bed feathers into wreaths, so it was burned alive here. Hedgehog bellows were also used to wean babies; the mother placed them on the breast as a deterrent.

Hedgehog as a metaphor

The hedgehog's spiked dress is regularly used as a metaphor for a defensive defense. Well-known examples are the poem Fox and Igel by Wilhelm Busch or the hedgehog position , in which foot soldiers have been gathering in a circle since the Middle Ages and pointing their spears outwards together . The idiom also goes back to this.

literature

  • Michael Lohmann: The practical hedgehog book. Behavior, food, diseases, protection, help, care, wintering. BLV, Munich et al. 2001, ISBN 3-405-16015-4 .
  • Pat Morris: The New Hedgehog Book. New edition. Whittet, London 2006, ISBN 1-873580-71-1 .
  • Monika Neumeier: The hedgehog practice book. Proper care, rearing and housing. Kosmos, Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-440-08954-1 .
  • Monika Neumeier: Hedgehogs in our garden. Franckh-Kosmos, Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-440-07050-6 .
  • Hermann Holz, Jochen Niethammer: Erinacaeus europaeus - brown-breasted hedgehog. In: Jochen Niethammer, Franz Krapp (Ed.): Handbook of Mammals in Europe. Volume 3/1: insectivores, master animals. AULA-Verlag, Wiesbaden 1990, ISBN 3-89104-027-X , pp. 26-49.
  • Nigel Reeve: Hedgehogs. Poyser, London 1994, ISBN 0-85661-081-X .
  • Susanne Struck: The hedgehog's diet. (Erinaceus europaeus L., 1758). Basics and practice. Schlueter, Hannover 1998, ISBN 3-87706-517-1 .
  • MARCELLI DE MEDICAMENTIS LIBER - Marcellus on Remedies, Eduard E. Liechtenhahn, translated by Jutta Kollesch and Diethard Nickel, second edition, Akademieverlag Berlin 1968, license number : 202 - 100/210/68. Chapter 6 (Against hair loss, lice and falling out and sick hair) contains recipes with hedgehog flap.
  • Tanja Wrobbel, Monika Neumeier, Dora Lambert, Ulli Seewald: Hedgehogs in the veterinary practice . Ed .: Pro Igel eV (=  Igel knowledge compact ). 6th edition. Lindau / B. 2015, ISBN 978-3-940377-13-5 ( pro-igel.de [PDF; 3.3 MB ]).

Web links

Commons : Brown-breasted Hedgehog  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Pat Morris: The New Hedgehog Book. Whittet, London 2006.
  2. a b c d e f g h i j Michael Lohmann: The practical hedgehog book. FSVO, Munich 2001.
  3. a b c d e f g h i j k l m Monika Neumeier: Das Igel-Praxisbuch. Kosmos, Stuttgart 2006.
  4. a b Elisabeth Landes, among others: Investigations into the composition of hedgehog milk and the development of hedgehog babies. In: Small Animal Practice. No. 42, 1997, ISSN  0023-2076 , pp. 647-658.
  5. a b Iris Maibaum, Michael Fehr: The hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus) as a wild animal patient in the small animal practice. In: Kleintierpraxis 59 (2014), pp. 417–428.
  6. BR: Igel on the Red List , Chapter 4.1 of the Entire Species List of Mammals 2017 BayLfU
  7. portal Beee and Igel-in-Bayern.de
  8. ^ A pacifist in a spiky dress: The Hedgehog , on bund-hessen.de, accessed on October 3, 2015
  9. http://wien.orf.at/news/stories/2742296/ City leaves piles of leaves for hedgehogs, orf.at, November 15, 2015, accessed November 15, 2015.
  10. Erinaceus europaeus. ( Memento of the original from July 3, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Don E. Wilson , DeeAnn M. Reeder (Eds.): Mammal Species of the World. A taxonomic and geographic Reference. 2 volumes. 3. Edition. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore MD 2005, ISBN 0-8018-8221-4 . Retrieved March 23, 2010.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.bucknell.edu
  11. Erinaceus roumanicus. ( Memento of the original from June 24, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Don E. Wilson, DeeAnn M. Reeder (Eds.): Mammal Species of the World. A taxonomic and geographic Reference. 2 volumes. 3. Edition. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore MD 2005, ISBN 0-8018-8221-4 . Retrieved March 23, 2010.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.bucknell.edu
  12. Waverley Root : Quail, Truffle, Chocolate. The encyclopedia of culinary delicacies (= Goldmann 72088 btb ). Goldmann, Munich 1996, ISBN 3-442-72088-5 , p. 138.
  13. Roma cuisine - cabbage and hedgehog. In: Der Standard , September 30, 2010.
  14. specially protected according to § 7 paragraph 2 no. 13 c) Federal Nature Conservation Act (BNatSchG) with Annex 1 to the Federal Species Protection Ordinance . Bans according to § 44 paragraph 1 (access) and paragraph 2 (possession) BNatSchG, whereby according to § 45 paragraph 5 BNatSchG it is exceptionally permissible to take in individual injured, sick or helpless hedgehogs for the time it takes to reintroduce them to the wild can.
This version was added to the list of articles worth reading on December 27, 2005 .