Gills logs and blogs.

Gills hog blogs.
Are hedgehogs intelligent?

by Gill Dixon, PGCE,MA,BHScHons,RGN.

The short answer to this question is NOT VERY. However I guess it depends how one defines intelligence. All mammals are capable of complex behaviour and usually respond to environmental, physiological and behavioural factors and pressures.

Intelligence, in my opinion is  in itself neither valuable or particularly interesting really. We all know of highly intelligent people who lack any common sense or flexibility of thought.

Hedgehogs tend to fit the general ecological model of an animal with limited brain development and their anatomy seems to suggest the same but some of their behaviours are usually associated with something with greater intelligence, such as their need to hunt for live and often patchily distributed prey, their ability to navigate well and their excellent maternal care. Their brain development though is pretty much unchanged since they first appeared 15 million years ago! (They have though survived for 15 million years).

Hedgehog behaviour   is far from stereotyped and dull, and their sense of smell and  hearing are highly developed.

Lindemann (1951) and Herter (1965) trained hedgehogs to carry out a number of remarkable and complex tricks and these learned behaviours were not forgotten even after months of hibernation. One such hedgehog learned to curl and uncurl on command and recognised its own name.

The hedgehog seems to have quite a good memory, especially for places and it is perfectly developed for the life it is meant to lead, but perhaps the fact that it has not evolved to cope with reduced available foodstuffs and diminishing habitat is a measure of lack of intelligence as it has brought the species to now critically low levels. However perhaps an intelligent hedgehog would say that it is the behaviour of humans that is to blame and perhaps it is the intelligence of  humankind that should be questioned!

                                                   

Ref: Reeve,N Hedgehogs. (1994) Pub:Poyser Natural History.

Rescue, rehabilitate, release.

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