Pest

Pest Hedgehog Report 🦔

Introduction:

Hedgehogs, we think of them as the cute, spiky animals that sonic was made after but really they are quite sinister (depending on where they are from) here in New Zealand because just like stoats, rats, possums and many more animals hedgehogs are pests. A pest is an organism that attacks other animals, duplicates over and over again until they are at the top of a food chain, and spreads deadly diseases to plant, animal and human life. Today Me, Zach, and my partner James are going to tell you how they affect the environment and how to stop them from doing anymore damage to our native species. 

Why were Hedgehogs brought to New Zealand?

Hedgehogs came to New Zealand when they were brought to New Zealand by British colonists in 1869. The DOC website states that the European hedgehog was brought over to New Zealand because travellers wanted something to remind them of home but people realised that they can be used as tools rather than pets. Hedgehogs in Europe usually eat slugs, snails and other kind of small insects which we have plenty of here, but over the years the hedgehogs got didn’t really feel like they had enough so they adapted, evolved to eating our native species Including: Weta, native skinks, baby tuatara and other little lizards. Now we have brought in another pest that is killing and slaughtering our native species putting them closer and closer to the brink of extinction.

The hedgehog makes the environment worse so trapping it will help. 

This graph shows the populated areas where hedgehogs are normally seen or found. The darker green areas are where the hedgehogs are more commonly seen and found, the lighter green areas mean that they are less seen as most but still seen and the white is where they are not seen at all. Hedgehogs, just like other pests, can breed at mass proportion so they can expand on area faster than other animals, most of our native species don’t breed fast so they can't keep up with other pests killing them over and over again. The best and cheapest way of killing them in my research is trapping them.

Effect on the Food web

The hedgehogs, just like other pests, have a big impact on the food web. The problem is that pests do not stop eating if you take away a main food source from them or if the food source goes extinct then the pest you know about will find something else to eat and it’ll keep eating and eating and eating until it dies. But the cool/bad thing about pests is that they are able to mass produce so you’ll have all these other little baby hedgehogs running around eating even more than the previous one. Hedgehogs in New Zealand have adapted to eating our native wēta because they are bigger, juicer and much easier to catch since they can not fly. 

EFect 1

One of the ways hedgehogs have an effect on The environment is by spreading diseases to other animals such as dogs and cats. They can even affect us humans. One of the diseases they spread is salmonella. Salmonella is what makes people sick and can make you have a fever and stomach cramps. To get rid of salmonella you would need antibiotics. They also spread mange mites which can cause a lot of different skin conditions. Mites can also make your dog's life uncomfortable by living in your dog's fur or ears.

Effect 2

One hedgehog can devour multiple native animals, lizards, bird eggs and very young chicks, wēta, and other native animals. One study found in a single hedgehog stomach 283 wēta legs(I divided 283 by 6 because that I came out with was that that particular hedgehog had eaten 47 wēta and other various animals in a 24 hour period.

Solution 1 Poison

People are against 1080  because it can kill the wrong animals like your dog or cat and how it makes them suffer by making them have muscle spasms and seizures. But New Zealand uses it to get rid of their pests which are mammals and since New zealand native animals are birds they can use 1080. 1080 Does not have a major effect on birds because it's mainly targeted on mammals. 1080 is biodegradable and is environmentally friendly; there is also another poison PAPP It’s a new poison made in New Zealand. It is mainly used to control stoats and feral cats. It makes them sleepy and sluggish then becoming unresponsive, dying slowly.

Solution 2 Trapping

Trapping, unlike poison and hunting, reverts to a much faster way of killing the pest, if the trap works properly, and is only put in places that pests can get to. One of the bright sides of Trapping is that it can target all pests (stoats, rats, ferrets, possums, and hedgehogs) unlike hunting which only is able to target possums and larger pests. The other good thing about trapping is that it is environmentally friendly and doesn’t hurt our native species and other animals other than the one that the trap is meant to catch. The down side of trapping is that you can't cover everything or else it becomes a hazard and then more pollution for others Including the animals that we try to protect. And you need a lot more people than poison and hunting.

Solution 3 Hunting

Hunting has a high cost because you either hire a hunter or be a hunter. If you're a hunter then you need to buy a gun and the price of a hunting rifle is around 200$. But if you already have one then you would need the landowners permission and a permit for the gun. If you're going to hire a hunter, be ready with a lot of money for 5,000$ - 20,000$ because that's how expensive hunters are in New zealand. So if you're going to go hunting I wouldn't recommend it.

This shows us that trapping is the best solution to mitigate hedgehogs because it’s environment friendly but it does need some people to be involved so the traps can be reset. Trapping is the most effective way that we know that doesn’t change the surrounding environment and hedgehogs don't have too much of a high IQ compared to other pests that we know of. Hedgehogs have an IQ score the same as a hamster while other pests like the stoat, possum, and rat have shown that they can learn new things overtime. Which means they won't be too smart to just walk past a trap without being curious thinking they could grab a snack and BANG! They're dead because they're dumb and have nothing over basic IQ.

Conclusion 

So what our research shows is that hedgehogs are not all as good as sonic and trapping is the best way to kill this pest. Trapping can reduce the numbers of hedgehogs at a fast rate without doing much damage to the environment and native species. So that solves our BIG question on our Inquiry, trapping is the best way of getting rid of hedgehogs that is our report for our #2 Inquiry thanks for reading.

James and Zach.

                                     Bibliography 

         DOC                                                          WIKI                                        Other

        Website 1                                             Wikipedia                                Pest detective

                                                                                                                       Hedgehog killer

                                                                                                                        The guardian