Well, THEY are wholly to blame for the horror show described so well by this lady in her letter to the Yorkshire Post!
Blame mink for decline From: Margaret Handley, Boltby, Thirsk.
I LIVE in a small rural village where, until last summer, we had a thriving hedgehog population. However, mink have become an increasingly prominent feature here, with sightings and several attacks on cats. I first encountered a mink nest here about 20 years ago on the bank of a stream. Years later I saw in daylight one crossing a bridge over a stream, less than a mile from the site of the mink nest. In July 2013, one of my cats came home late one night with a broken front leg. The bone had been bitten through. The vet considered this to a be mink bite. Thereafter, several cats from the village disappeared. Last year I had been feeding two hedgehogs on my driveway all summer. A friend in the village had also been regularly feeding five hedgehogs. Keeping warm for 40 years A company founded to help Yorkshire men and women avoid traveling to Lancashire to buy a wood burner has celebrated its 40th birthday. Read MorePromoted by Town & Country Fires It was around August when my two hedgehogs stopped coming and the other five gradually disappeared. Then, in autumn, two more cats from the village were taken to the vet with mink bites. As spring approaches, we can only hope our hedgehogs will return but their untimely disappearance leaves us in doubt. In my opinion, mink have been overlooked as cause of hedgehog decline in rural areas, and I think the time has come for action to reduce the mink population.
Read more at: https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/opinion/yp-letters-let-theresa-may-get-on-with-the-job-of-leaving-eu-1-9028916
