As they do every fall, the trees are once again beginning to shed their leaves. The resulting leaves are often raked into large piles and, like prunings, collected in a few designated areas until they are hauled away. Such piles of leaves can once again be seen in many places throughout the city of Salzgitter.
From a nature conservation perspective, however, leaves and other green waste should not be completely removed. As much of it as possible should be spread out in piles under bushes, hedges, and trees to provide small animals—especially hedgehogs—with shelter and necessary winter quarters.
The City of Salzgitter’s nature conservation authority therefore asks everyone who rakes up leaves to make an active contribution to species conservation. In areas where it is safe to do so, collected leaves should not be removed until late spring. This ensures undisturbed shelter for hibernating animals such as hedgehogs and other creatures that have already taken up residence there.
Think of hedgehogs when programming robotic lawnmowers
To protect hedgehogs, care should be taken to avoid harming these nocturnal animals when using robotic lawn mowers. Since hedgehogs do not flee when threatened but instead curl up into a ball, relying on their quills for protection, an encounter with a robotic lawn mower is often fatal. Therefore, it is recommended to program robotic lawn mowers to run only during the day, starting no earlier than 30 minutes after sunrise and ending no later than 30 minutes before sunset.
Natural garden design
If you want to help hedgehogs, you should design and maintain your gardens and green spaces in a way that is as close to nature as possible, ideally year-round. For advice and tips on handling hedgehogs and helping them through the winter, please contact the city’s local nature conservation authority at 05341/839-3421 or -3695, or visit the website www.pro-igel.de (opens in a new tab).
By the way: All hedgehogs weighing at least 500 grams are healthy enough to survive the winter on their own. Aside from a suitable shelter, they do not need any further help.
