While doing this project I realized
that hedgehogs are more well known for their pop culture stars, and
few know about the actual animals themselves. Also, in Europe these
animals naturally run wild, so some people eat them and others view
them as friendly wildlife, as people in the United States might view
a squirrel. When looking at the many different ways in which people
around the world interact with the hedgehog, it varies to a great
degree, even though hedgehogs do not vary much from one species to
another. This can be said of any animal. Dogs are perhaps the most
variable as they can be considered companions, partners, service
animals, food, wildlife, and even pests. While I was aware of this, I
did not know just how intelligent dogs and other animals are, which
brings up issues of how we should treat them. Some animals, like the
killer whale, may actually be smarter than us and experience more
emotions than we do; I question the ethics of keeping such an animal
in captivity for entertainment or any other purpose. Also, in order
for one animal to bring us joy, it may cause so many others pain,
which is the case for some dolphins, many puppy mills, and large
exotic animals. Instead of focusing on what is right in front of us,
humans need to look at how their actions impact animals, whether or
not they care for that particular species.
Wednesday, May 7, 2014
Moral Vision Statement
Moral Vision Statement:
With so many interactions between
humans and animals, one must ask themselves how they view these
creatures. Do they have intrinsic value, or do they get all of their
value from the emotional or financial investment a human places in
them? Is it wrong for a pet cat to kill a pet mouse, but acceptable
for the same cat to kill a wild mouse that has invaded the home? Many
would argue that we should not kill animals at all since they are
intelligent, emotional being who have wants and feelings, but animals
still kill other animals, and many need to do so in order to survive.
What we need to worry about, is not whether or not we should kill
animals, but how we kill them. We should not end their lives
unnecessarily, and if we must kill them, then we should make sure
that they suffer as little as possible in the process. Even if we do
not eat them, animals are still used in a variety of ways, and in
using them we must be sure that we are giving them high quality
lives. This might mean housing chickens differently, or euthanizing a
dog in a shelter who is suffering psychological damage. While all
species are not equal, all species can suffer from poor treatment,
and need to be regarded. Animals do have intrinsic value, but the
human-animal bond can make one animal even more valuable than other
members of its species.
Compromise
Compromise:
Three concerns about keeping hedgehogs
as pets
- Welfare of pet hedgehogs
While care for these animals is not
easy, they are in many ways easier to care for than a dog or a cat.
The lack of research done on this particular animal makes hard facts
difficult to find. However, a breeder can ensure that the person to
whom they are selling the animal is aware of their specific
requirements. When an owner knows what is required and what to
expect, they can provide the animal with a high quality life.
- Hedgehogs harming the environment.
These animals could very well pose a
threat if enough of them were released in certain states. Though the
threat to livestock is not great since importation of hedgehogs is
already illegal, they could still survive very well in states like
California, and should remain illegal in this state. If someone
living in one of these states did want to own one, a permit should be
available, but should not be easy to obtain. This would allow the
animals to be kept track of while still discouraging owners who will
not responsibly care for these pets.
- Owners of hedgehogs being harmed.
While humans may be harmed from
handling hedgehogs, the amount of harm is minimal when they treated
correctly. Any pet poses some risk, and hedgehogs are actually less
likely to bite than more common companion animals. Before purchasing
this animal, one should hold them bare handed and check for an
allergic reaction in the next few hours. Also, when selling the
animal, the breeder should show the new owner proper handling
techniques in order to minimize incidents of injury.
Sources:
http://www.peta.org/issues/companion-animal-issues/companion-animals-factsheets/inside-exotic-animal-trade/
http://www.pogstarhedgehogs.com/articles/wantahedgehog.html
http://www.smallanimalchannel.com/critter-experts/hedgehog/do-hedgehogs-make-good-pets-for-children-0910.aspx
Sources:
http://www.peta.org/issues/companion-animal-issues/companion-animals-factsheets/inside-exotic-animal-trade/
http://www.pogstarhedgehogs.com/articles/wantahedgehog.html
http://www.smallanimalchannel.com/critter-experts/hedgehog/do-hedgehogs-make-good-pets-for-children-0910.aspx
Controversial topic-con
Controversial topic-con
Source:
http://www.peta.org/issues/companion-animal-issues/companion-animals-factsheets/inside-exotic-animal-trade/
Dear PETA,
Your concerns about exotic pet
ownership are valid, especially concerning hedgehogs. These animals
are not domesticated, and do not make good companion animals. Many of
these animals are illegally imported into the United States after
being taken from their natural habitats. During the journey, many
will become sick or injured, which often leads to death. Even if they
survive the journey or are bred in the US, many owners do not provide
them proper care. When they are curled tightly into a ball, someone
trying to unroll them can cause injury to both themselves and the
animal. Additionally, a number of people who obtain hedgehogs are
actually allergic to them. For this reason, or simply because they
are difficult to care for, owners will often release them into the
wild. In some parts of the country they will die from exposure or
predators, but in other parts they can actually thrive, becoming an
invasive species and spreading disease to other animals, including
livestock.
Though some people are bonded to their
pet hedgehogs, the satisfaction they receive from owning one is not
enough to justify the suffering of that animal and many more like it.
Thank you for taking a stand against owning this exotic animal.
Source:
http://www.peta.org/issues/companion-animal-issues/companion-animals-factsheets/inside-exotic-animal-trade/
Controversial topic-pro
Controversial topic-pro
Dear hedgehogs breeders of the United
States,
Many are concerned that hedgehogs do
not make good pets and therefore should not be bred for this purpose.
However, hedgehogs can make very good pets for the responsible owner.
When they are young, they must be handled often and given to owners
who understand hedgehogs and how to care for them. When this happens,
a very strong bond can form between the human and animal. Also, for
many people keeping a hedgehog is much easier than caring for a dog
or cat; since they have quills, these animals do not need to be
bathed more than a few times a week. Also, they are often asleep
during the day and active in the evening, making them the ideal pet
for someone who has work or school during the day. Even children can
benefit from having this creature as a pet since they rarely bite and
the quills will quickly teach a child how to handle a hedgehog
properly.
Though some are concerned about the
welfare of these animals and the diseases they could spread to humans
and livestock, a responsible owner has nothing to worry about. Thank
you for breeding this wonderful animal, and I hope in the future you
will continue to be legally allowed to do so.
Sources:
http://www.pogstarhedgehogs.com/articles/wantahedgehog.html
http://www.smallanimalchannel.com/critter-experts/hedgehog/do-hedgehogs-make-good-pets-for-children-0910.aspx
Sources:
http://www.pogstarhedgehogs.com/articles/wantahedgehog.html
http://www.smallanimalchannel.com/critter-experts/hedgehog/do-hedgehogs-make-good-pets-for-children-0910.aspx
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
In this blog I will be writing extensively about hedgehogs. In
particular, I will be writing about the species which I keep in my home,
the African Pygmy hedgehog.
While the African Pygmy is known as the most common domesticated species of hedgehog, some would argue that this type of hedgehog is neither a species nor domesticated. Because the importation of hedgehogs to the United States is now illegal, breeders have made this type by cross breeding the Algerian Hedgehog and the Four Toed (White-Bellied) Hedgehog. Also, hedgehogs themselves only began to be domesticated during the 1980's, which does not give them much time to develop the traits necessary.
Over 60,000 wild African hedgehogs were imported into the United States and Canada before the USDA implemented strict quarantines on imported animals. Children in Africa were paid around 50 cents per hedgehog and would collect them from the garbage dumps in which they lived. There, they were as common as a rat in a landfill, but here they first sold for hundreds of dollars. Not only were they used for companion animals at first, but also for blood clot research.
Hedgehogs have become more domesticated since the 1980's, but the fact that some breeders select for color instead of tameness has slowed the process down considerably. They have a better temperament than their wild counterparts, but no signs of neoteny have developed, indicating that hedgehogs still have a long way to go until they are truly considered domesticated.
Because hedgehogs are not completely domesticated and are therefore not in many households, their interactions with the average human are minimal. Yes, in some countries they are hunted and eaten, but even there most people do not rely on hedgehogs as a food source. Sonic the Hedgehog and other popular characters in pop culture are more well known than the animals themselves (more on this further down). While those who own hedgehogs enjoy their company, when a person who has never seen one up close before approaches them, it is with both interest and fear. After all, rubbing a hedgehog the wrong way is more painful for the person than for the animal.
In the wild, hedgehogs are not very social creatures (another trait which does not help speedy domestication.) They come together only to breed, and the mother raises her young alone. In captivity many hedgehogs have bonded with their owners, but keeping more than one hedgehog together can be dangerous. The emotion that is easiest to detect in hedgehogs is that a fear. When they are scared they make themselves into a ball of quills and making angry huffing noises.
In the wild, most predators had no way around this and would give up on trying to eat hedgehogs. Now this defense discourages human-animal interaction and makes bonding more difficult. For the first month that I had my hedgehog he would go into defense mode anytime I entered the room. If a hedgehog is not very afraid, but simply nervous they will put up their spikes while moving around, and if they are only a bit uncertain they will have their head spikes up only.
Because these animals are not widely studied, not much is known about their emotions. One example of this is the phenomenon called “self-anointing” or simply “anointing”. Sometimes when a hedgehog smells something new or particularly smelly, they will produce foamy saliva and cover as many of their spikes as possible with it. While theories include trying to remember a certain smell or the foam being a toxin to their predators, no conclusive evidence has been found.
Studying hedgehog intelligence is challenging for these reasons as well. While their sense of sight is not the best, their sense of smell and hearing makes up for it. Besides this, they have an excellent sense of motion, even if their eyes are closed, which assists them in hunting insects and knowing when it is safe to come out of their defensive ball. Another sense they have is emotion detection. When being handled they pick up on the emotions of the person and act accordingly.
While here in the Unites States many consider hedgehog to be novel pets, there are many states that restrict ownership. In Pennsylvania, Hawaii, and California it is illegal to own hedgehogs at all. Arizona and Maine require permits while in a few other states miscellaneous rules apply. For example, hedgehogs are only legal in certain counties or can be breed but must be shipped out of state in Georgia, Nebraska, and New York. This number has decreased; over a quarter of the United States has at one time had strict rules on hedgehog ownership. These states fear that escaped pets will thrive in the wild, spreading disease and competing with the local wildlife.
Or perhaps they are concerned about this possibility:
As I mentioned earlier, the importing of hedgehogs into the United States was made illegal in 1991 when it was found that they can carry foot-and-mouth disease. While not harmful to humans, this can destroy livestock populations. The last case of foot-and-mouth disease in the United States was in 1929, but many other countries have been affected greatly by this disease.
In other countries, where hedgehogs roam in the wild, they are viewed very differently. The European hedgehog is considered by most a welcome garden guest who will eat harmful insects. Unfortunately, these animals are becoming endangered in many areas. One reason is because people often try to give them milk, even though they are lactose intolerant. Another very common cause of hedgehog death in many countries is being hit by cars. Their natural defense mechanism works against them, and people have taken to building hedgehog tunnels under some roads to give them a safe way to pass.
Where it is not illegal to catch and kill them, some people do eat hedgehogs. The suggested method of cooking is covering them with clay and baking them in a fire so that the quills will be easily removed. Gypsies have been accused of eating hedgehogs and although it was once an important part of their culture, it is not very common anymore. In China, they are considered sacred, while in Africa keeping them as pets is just as common as cooking them for meat.
People have been fascinated with hedgehogs for centuries. There are museums that have ancient Egyptian sculptures of hedgehogs and a wooden sculpture of a hedgehog from ancient Greece is as well. Since then people have continued using these animals in their art. While drawings and paintings of hedgehogs abound, the internet has taken one picture of a particular hedgehog and made it into a meme about art historians.
One reason why humans are so fascinated by hedgehogs is because of their quills. This unique feature sets them apart, making them an interesting character in many different forms of media. Hans-My-Hedgehog is a folk tale which was recorded by Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm. In this story, a man is so desperate for a son that he says even a hedgehog will do. When his wife has a child, he is half hedgehog they are very disappointed. His quills prevent him from nursing and eventually he punishes a princess for being dishonest by stabbing her multiple times. In the end he marries another princess and sheds his hedgehog skin, revealing a handsome man underneath. The full story can be found in full here: Hans My Hedghog
Beatrix Potter wrote many stories about animals, and one of her characters was a hedgehog named Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle. In this story the hedgehog does all of the laundry for the neighborhood and a little girl comes and helps her.
However, the most famous hedgehog is Sonic the Hedgehog who began as a video game character in 1991. This franchise also includes books and movies about him and his friends, including two other hedgehogs named Shadow and Silver. The popularity of Sonic has increased with the ownership of hedgehogs in the United States.
The video games feature Sonic forming a ball and bouncing around levels very quickly collecting golden rings. Sonic and friends have very fleshed out back stories about from where Sonic originated, his enemy Dr. Robotnik, and his “brother” Shadow who is actually faster than Sonic despite the blue hedgehog being “the fastest thing alive” according to the opening of the television series.
A movie more geared toward adults that had a hedgehog named Sebastian is the Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. At one point, a wizard who lives in the forest with many animals is dismayed when he sees that his hedgehog friend is sick. At first he attempts to treat him for poisons while Sebastian's concerned family gathers around him. The wizard realizes that dark magic is harming the hedgehog and treats him accordingly, bring him back to normal. While this scene is touching, it portrays hedgehog as highly social animals, when in reality they are very solitary.
Here in the United States we celebrate Groundhog Day on February 2nd. In ancient Rome, they celebrated Hedgehog Day. If the creature came out and saw its shadow in the moonlight there would be six more weeks of winter. Because there are no wild hedgehogs native to the United States, the animal responsible became the groundhog.
Although many are fascinated with hedgehogs and put them in their stories if they cannot keep a pet themselves, some believe that they should not be kept as pets at all. Because they are not fully domesticated, many classify them as exotic pets. Many kinds of exotics should not be kept as pets by the average person because they are difficult to care for. The HSUS and PETA suggest that it is not in the best interest of neither the human nor the hedgehog because they cannot be taken care of properly and can spread disease. While this is true of any animal being illegally imported into the country, many pet hedgehogs were breed in the United States by responsible breeders. Also, many sources site hedgehogs as animals which are low maintenance. I hesitate to classify any animal as this, because all animals can take a large amount of care if they fall ill, and owners should be prepared for this. Still, hedgehogs do not take much more care than a rabbit or guinea pig, and as long as a new owner does their research, a hedgehog's lifespan should not be lowered by captivity, but rather lengthened.
Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domesticated_hedgehog
While the African Pygmy is known as the most common domesticated species of hedgehog, some would argue that this type of hedgehog is neither a species nor domesticated. Because the importation of hedgehogs to the United States is now illegal, breeders have made this type by cross breeding the Algerian Hedgehog and the Four Toed (White-Bellied) Hedgehog. Also, hedgehogs themselves only began to be domesticated during the 1980's, which does not give them much time to develop the traits necessary.
Over 60,000 wild African hedgehogs were imported into the United States and Canada before the USDA implemented strict quarantines on imported animals. Children in Africa were paid around 50 cents per hedgehog and would collect them from the garbage dumps in which they lived. There, they were as common as a rat in a landfill, but here they first sold for hundreds of dollars. Not only were they used for companion animals at first, but also for blood clot research.
Hedgehogs have become more domesticated since the 1980's, but the fact that some breeders select for color instead of tameness has slowed the process down considerably. They have a better temperament than their wild counterparts, but no signs of neoteny have developed, indicating that hedgehogs still have a long way to go until they are truly considered domesticated.
Because hedgehogs are not completely domesticated and are therefore not in many households, their interactions with the average human are minimal. Yes, in some countries they are hunted and eaten, but even there most people do not rely on hedgehogs as a food source. Sonic the Hedgehog and other popular characters in pop culture are more well known than the animals themselves (more on this further down). While those who own hedgehogs enjoy their company, when a person who has never seen one up close before approaches them, it is with both interest and fear. After all, rubbing a hedgehog the wrong way is more painful for the person than for the animal.
In the wild, hedgehogs are not very social creatures (another trait which does not help speedy domestication.) They come together only to breed, and the mother raises her young alone. In captivity many hedgehogs have bonded with their owners, but keeping more than one hedgehog together can be dangerous. The emotion that is easiest to detect in hedgehogs is that a fear. When they are scared they make themselves into a ball of quills and making angry huffing noises.
In the wild, most predators had no way around this and would give up on trying to eat hedgehogs. Now this defense discourages human-animal interaction and makes bonding more difficult. For the first month that I had my hedgehog he would go into defense mode anytime I entered the room. If a hedgehog is not very afraid, but simply nervous they will put up their spikes while moving around, and if they are only a bit uncertain they will have their head spikes up only.
Because these animals are not widely studied, not much is known about their emotions. One example of this is the phenomenon called “self-anointing” or simply “anointing”. Sometimes when a hedgehog smells something new or particularly smelly, they will produce foamy saliva and cover as many of their spikes as possible with it. While theories include trying to remember a certain smell or the foam being a toxin to their predators, no conclusive evidence has been found.
Studying hedgehog intelligence is challenging for these reasons as well. While their sense of sight is not the best, their sense of smell and hearing makes up for it. Besides this, they have an excellent sense of motion, even if their eyes are closed, which assists them in hunting insects and knowing when it is safe to come out of their defensive ball. Another sense they have is emotion detection. When being handled they pick up on the emotions of the person and act accordingly.
While here in the Unites States many consider hedgehog to be novel pets, there are many states that restrict ownership. In Pennsylvania, Hawaii, and California it is illegal to own hedgehogs at all. Arizona and Maine require permits while in a few other states miscellaneous rules apply. For example, hedgehogs are only legal in certain counties or can be breed but must be shipped out of state in Georgia, Nebraska, and New York. This number has decreased; over a quarter of the United States has at one time had strict rules on hedgehog ownership. These states fear that escaped pets will thrive in the wild, spreading disease and competing with the local wildlife.
Or perhaps they are concerned about this possibility:
As I mentioned earlier, the importing of hedgehogs into the United States was made illegal in 1991 when it was found that they can carry foot-and-mouth disease. While not harmful to humans, this can destroy livestock populations. The last case of foot-and-mouth disease in the United States was in 1929, but many other countries have been affected greatly by this disease.
In other countries, where hedgehogs roam in the wild, they are viewed very differently. The European hedgehog is considered by most a welcome garden guest who will eat harmful insects. Unfortunately, these animals are becoming endangered in many areas. One reason is because people often try to give them milk, even though they are lactose intolerant. Another very common cause of hedgehog death in many countries is being hit by cars. Their natural defense mechanism works against them, and people have taken to building hedgehog tunnels under some roads to give them a safe way to pass.
Where it is not illegal to catch and kill them, some people do eat hedgehogs. The suggested method of cooking is covering them with clay and baking them in a fire so that the quills will be easily removed. Gypsies have been accused of eating hedgehogs and although it was once an important part of their culture, it is not very common anymore. In China, they are considered sacred, while in Africa keeping them as pets is just as common as cooking them for meat.
People have been fascinated with hedgehogs for centuries. There are museums that have ancient Egyptian sculptures of hedgehogs and a wooden sculpture of a hedgehog from ancient Greece is as well. Since then people have continued using these animals in their art. While drawings and paintings of hedgehogs abound, the internet has taken one picture of a particular hedgehog and made it into a meme about art historians.
One reason why humans are so fascinated by hedgehogs is because of their quills. This unique feature sets them apart, making them an interesting character in many different forms of media. Hans-My-Hedgehog is a folk tale which was recorded by Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm. In this story, a man is so desperate for a son that he says even a hedgehog will do. When his wife has a child, he is half hedgehog they are very disappointed. His quills prevent him from nursing and eventually he punishes a princess for being dishonest by stabbing her multiple times. In the end he marries another princess and sheds his hedgehog skin, revealing a handsome man underneath. The full story can be found in full here: Hans My Hedghog
Beatrix Potter wrote many stories about animals, and one of her characters was a hedgehog named Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle. In this story the hedgehog does all of the laundry for the neighborhood and a little girl comes and helps her.
However, the most famous hedgehog is Sonic the Hedgehog who began as a video game character in 1991. This franchise also includes books and movies about him and his friends, including two other hedgehogs named Shadow and Silver. The popularity of Sonic has increased with the ownership of hedgehogs in the United States.
The video games feature Sonic forming a ball and bouncing around levels very quickly collecting golden rings. Sonic and friends have very fleshed out back stories about from where Sonic originated, his enemy Dr. Robotnik, and his “brother” Shadow who is actually faster than Sonic despite the blue hedgehog being “the fastest thing alive” according to the opening of the television series.
A movie more geared toward adults that had a hedgehog named Sebastian is the Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. At one point, a wizard who lives in the forest with many animals is dismayed when he sees that his hedgehog friend is sick. At first he attempts to treat him for poisons while Sebastian's concerned family gathers around him. The wizard realizes that dark magic is harming the hedgehog and treats him accordingly, bring him back to normal. While this scene is touching, it portrays hedgehog as highly social animals, when in reality they are very solitary.
Here in the United States we celebrate Groundhog Day on February 2nd. In ancient Rome, they celebrated Hedgehog Day. If the creature came out and saw its shadow in the moonlight there would be six more weeks of winter. Because there are no wild hedgehogs native to the United States, the animal responsible became the groundhog.
Although many are fascinated with hedgehogs and put them in their stories if they cannot keep a pet themselves, some believe that they should not be kept as pets at all. Because they are not fully domesticated, many classify them as exotic pets. Many kinds of exotics should not be kept as pets by the average person because they are difficult to care for. The HSUS and PETA suggest that it is not in the best interest of neither the human nor the hedgehog because they cannot be taken care of properly and can spread disease. While this is true of any animal being illegally imported into the country, many pet hedgehogs were breed in the United States by responsible breeders. Also, many sources site hedgehogs as animals which are low maintenance. I hesitate to classify any animal as this, because all animals can take a large amount of care if they fall ill, and owners should be prepared for this. Still, hedgehogs do not take much more care than a rabbit or guinea pig, and as long as a new owner does their research, a hedgehog's lifespan should not be lowered by captivity, but rather lengthened.
Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domesticated_hedgehog
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