It has been unusually mild in some places during the Swedish autumn. As recently as last Saturday, close to 17 degrees were measured in places in Småland. If the heat continues, it could hit the hedgehogs in the country hard.
The hedgehog normally hibernates when the temperature drops below ten degrees – usually in October. But in warmer weather it stays awake.
— If they are active in the winter and there is nothing to eat, then they will use up resources and energy and eventually starve to death if they can’t find any food, says Torbjörn Tyler, docent in ecology and museum curator at the Biological Museum at Lund University, to the P4 channel.
The hedgehog was already protected in 1972, and since 2020 the species is classified as “near threatened” and is red-listed in the SLU Species Data Bank.
Mild winter weather can be just as big a threat to the cones, which can wake up too early from their hibernation, unable to find food.