Stress in hedgehogs is triggered by environmental factors such as noise. When new, allow your pet to familiarize itself with its environment.
Afterward, you can start playing with it by spending less time and increase the duration gradually to prevent stress. Setting a timer may also help to prevent prolonged interactions that may stress your pet. Even if energetic, your hedgehog may not want to play with you for a longer duration since these pets are solitary.
Hedgehogs are curious and will sniff things around them to familiarize themselves with their environment. They also like tasting things, and if you smell tasty to them, they might bite you out of curiosity. Such a bite is not malicious and will rarely break your skin. It is also easy to notice such bites coming because your pet will sniff or lick you first before the bite.
Wearing jewels may also trigger a bite out of curiosity. Just like human beings, hedgehogs become hormonal during certain phases in their lives. A sow, for instance, will be hormonal during breeding and will bite more around this period.
Male hedgehogs, on the other hand, will bite more when close to their female counterparts. Also, due to their territorial nature , hedgehogs will bite you if you reach out to areas in their cage that they consider their territory.
Also, if you have two hedgehogs and give one more attention than the other, the other one may bite you though in rare circumstances. Therefore, whether your hedgehog bites you due to hormonal changes or out of curiosity, you should never hurt it in return. Doing this will make it tighten the bite and injure you.
You should also avoid pulling away, as this will encourage your pet to hold tightly and follow you. Instead, push your hand towards its head to open its jaw. You can also blow on its face severally to make it release its jaws. This way, your pet will know that biting is a bad thing. You can combine one or two of the above methods for effectiveness, and your pet should let you go willingly. At times, a hedgehog may refuse to let you go even after embracing the above techniques.
In such cases, you can put it under running water. This sudden stream will cause your pet to let go and find out what is happening. It is possible to foresee hedgehog bites, but this is not always the case. To stay safe, you can employ preventative measures such as handwashing, timed handling, and mood observation to prevent these bites.
Before handling your pet, clean your hands with unscented soap to remove lotion and food , which smells yummy to your hedgehog and could trigger them to bite you. You should also handle your pet in a clean environment and remove stressors such as loud noises which trigger it to bite. You can also handle your pet during different times of the day, rather than one prolonged handling, and take advantage of the time they are most comfortable to ensure they enjoy your company.
Despite being solitary, you should not stop your interactions with your hedgehog when they bite you. While it seems realistic, doing this makes the whole idea of owning this pet lose meaning. It will reduce the reason for bites. Handle your hedgehog with care. Always be gentle when holding your hedgehog. Do not squeeze or grip it tightly. Do not handle it high up in the air or that may give it a chance to fall and hurt itself. Respect your hedgehog. Hedgehogs have moods too!
It may want to sleep, eat, or exercise. Be sure to not interrupt its daily routine just because you want to hold it. This may irritate it into biting. Consider changing hand lotions or scented soap. Hedgehogs have extremely strong senses of smell. Learn to read hedgehog body language. Using the tips above, you should be able to learn what your hedgehog may do before it bites.
Watch your hedgehog and learn its personal behavioral traits to know when it is the best time to handle it. One tip is to watch its quills. When a hedgehog is in a relaxed pose, its quills will lie evenly against your hand and will not be sharp.
If it is in a defense pose, its quills will stand on end and be sharp! It means she feels threatened, and biting is her means of defending herself. Hedgehogs learn that if they nip, the hand gets pulled away, and therefore tend to bite in anticipation as a means of making something scary go away. Not Helpful 4 Helpful In theory, hedgehogs can transmit rabies, but in practice, this doesn't seem to happen.
They can carry diseases such as Yersinia the plague , hemorrhagic fever, and Mycobacterium, but these are rare in pet hedgehogs, so the risk is rare.
Just like any animal bite, there is a risk of bacterial infection of the wound, as the hedgehog's mouth is not a clean place. If you are bitten, wash the wound well, apply disinfectant, and seek medical advice. Not Helpful 10 Helpful Hedgehogs are not aggressive but, like any animal, may nip if startled or frightened. Their front teeth are strong and the nip can hurt, although it is unlikely to cause serious damage. Not Helpful 3 Helpful Hedgehogs have sharp incisors and can give a painful nip.
Immediately wash the area with soapy water. If there is any pain, heat, swelling, or discharge from the wound, then see a physician. This depends on the individual hedgehog. If they are well-socialized and used to people, they may well enjoy a fuss. However, a hedgehog that isn't familiar with people will be stressed by petting and roll up or try to hide. Not Helpful 5 Helpful The spines of a hedgehog are sharp and make for an uncomfortable experience against human skin.
Much like trying to handle pins or needles, the pricks can pierce the skin and draw blood. This gives him ample time to wake up fully, eat and drink, he also uses this opportunity to poop.
When hedgehogs feel threatened they can bite, as we found out. I remember taking our hedgehog to the vet to get his nails trimmed as we were not confident to do it ourselves. These cat biscuits do have more fat in them so we only tend to use these as treats and in moderation only. She eventually picked him up but he was not happy, he kept turning his head around trying to bite the glove.
You could see him breathing heavily as his little chest went up and down quickly. My daughter asked if the glove was causing the problem and if it had been used to handle any other animal? Our hedgehog felt threatened by the glove as he could smell a cat and was trying to fight back, causing him distress and anguish.
Whilst I have never been bitten by our pet hedgehog, my daughter has been bitten three times I think , on one occasion it was quite painful and the bite actually bled a little. Fortunately, she was up to date with her medicines so we only had to worry about using an antiseptic wipe to clean the area and then put a plaster on. He smelt the food on her fingers thinking it was dinner and went to eat it.
Whilst I was talking to my daughter, from the corner of my eye, I saw him open his mouth and move to my protruding index finger. In fact, half my finger was in his wide-open mouth before I realized and I quickly managed to pull my finger out of the way.
Wow, that was close but it was all my fault for having the smell of his food on my finger and him with his poor eyesight not realizing it was my finger and not his dinner. This usually happens when they are young and think your fingers are going to feed them if they have been fed via a syringe as they had no mother. The youngsters can't really bite too hard and when I've been bitten it's more like a little clamp around your finger than fangs digging in to your skin.
The adult hedgehogs have a more powerful bits and have two small rabbit like front teeth that when bitten will penetrate your skin.
They tend to latch on to you for a bit and if bitten, you will have a bit of tug of war to remove them. They are strong enough to dig their teeth in to your flesh, however, they very rarely bite.
I've only been bitten when I've woken up an adult hedgehog which was sleeping during the day. He was very unhappy with me and gave me a nice nip see photo. Like any animal bites, if bitten you would need a tetanus jab should you not be up to date with that. You would also need to visit your GP or a hospital so they can clean and dress the wound properly. Hedgehogs can make themselves seem nasty with defensive mechanisms including curling up in to a very spiky ball and pushing their needle spines out much like the hair on your skin when you get cold.
This makes them a lot harder to handle and tells you they don't want to be bothered.
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