# Aggressive Hedgehog Behavior



## Lady Alec (Jul 18, 2016)

Hello! After using this site to gain a lot of info on hedgies I finally joined to ask about some issues I'm having with my little hedgie. 

Let me start by giving a little history on my hedgehog. 

After dreaming about getting a hedgehog for a couple years but not having the means to do so a friend was given two for free and surprised me (a 21 year old graphic designer) with one of the babies. The brother and sister came from a friend of my friend who had bred their hedgehogs for the first time I believe. I got the girl and named her Cinnamon or Cinna for short. She was born on January 30th 2016 and I have now had her for four months. 

Right away she was incredibly social and friendly. She only huffed at me a couple times when I would wake her up. As I was unemployed I had a ton of free time and would take her out for hours. I would get her up about two in the afternoon and she would spend the rest of the day sleeping on my lap or on my shoulder. She would let me touch her anywhere and seemed to enjoy being petted. She was even quilling at the time that I got her and never once did she bite me or huff at me for touching her.

About a month ago her behavior drastically changed overnight. I had not changed anything in our routine or hand lotion/body stray etc. that I can think of but one night she suddenly began jumping around and huffing and at any touch she huffs attacked me. For a month now I have read everything I can and tried everything I can think of to get her to stop. She is not quilling that I can tell. I do not see new quills growing in and she has only lost maybe four the second week of this behavior starting. I have though given her oatmeal baths every month to help with itching/quilling. 

At this point it takes a great deal to get her to settle down in my lap on her blanket and anytime I try to touch her she freaks out. Also I can have my hand just sitting somewhere near her and out of the blue she will lunge at it and bite me with nothing provoking her. I have tried positive reinforcement using her favorite treat chicken to show her pets and touching are fine. I have tried negative reinforcement by saying "No" loudly, blowing on her, and pushing back into her mouth when she bites me. Recently I have even started dipping my fingers in lemon juice. This seems to discourage her but she will just aim her bites for parts of my hands that don't have lemon juice on them. I have pushed through all of this and continued to get her out everyday and try to still have bonding time with her. She has literally been taken out everyday since I got her even thought all of this biting. While she is still a bit huffy when my brother handles her she does not try to all out attack him like she does me.

I am at the point of being incredibly frustrated. My hands are covered in bite marks and sores where she has ripped skin away and made me bleed. I have tried everything I can think of and nothing seems to make a difference. My once loving hedgehog who helped me handle my stress and anxiety is now the cause of it. 

What am I doing wrong? How do I make her stop this behavior? 

Thank you!


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## nikki (Aug 28, 2008)

First off always use a blanket or piece of fleece to hold her in, don't give her the opportunity to bite your hands. Negative reinforcement does not work with hedgehogs and the lemon juice smell is probably just aggravating the problem. 

Some hedgehogs have a personality change when they mature and since she was about 5 months old when the change happened that could be part of the problem. Have you taken her to a vet for a check up? Behaviour changes can be the first sign of a health issue. 

Have you given her treats from your hands? This may have taught her to associate food with your hands and can encourage biting. There is a pinned post in the behaviour section called "So you have a biter" or something similar, it may be able to help with the issue.


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## Lady Alec (Jul 18, 2016)

nikki said:


> First off always use a blanket or piece of fleece to hold her in, don't give her the opportunity to bite your hands. Negative reinforcement does not work with hedgehogs and the lemon juice smell is probably just aggravating the problem.
> 
> Some hedgehogs have a personality change when they mature and since she was about 5 months old when the change happened that could be part of the problem. Have you taken her to a vet for a check up? Behaviour changes can be the first sign of a health issue.
> 
> Have you given her treats from your hands? This may have taught her to associate food with your hands and can encourage biting. There is a pinned post in the behaviour section called "So you have a biter" or something similar, it may be able to help with the issue.


Hi there. Thanks for the reply.

I do always use a fleece blanket. I made it very shortly after I got her and it has been what she sleeps in on my lap or in my arms for the majority of the time. But I am having the issue of her jumping around and huffing while in her blanket and it is hard to get her to even settle down enough to sleep in it. At any slight touch or movement of the blanket she will hiss and often try to leap out of the blanket to attack my hand.

I have not taken her to a vet yet as she has been in good physical heath but I will look into vets and if I can't make any progress with her I will take her to a vet. I'm just trying to just use all my recourses here before I do that.

As for the thread that was one of the first things I read when she first started this. Through out this entire month I have been reading post on here and other places about biting hedgehogs and that is where I got several of the ideas for how to handle the biting but so far no luck.

As for the food, yes I do hand feed her but I am 100% positive this has nothing to do with food. During the first three months of having her she would sometimes do a small nibble on my hand when they smelled like chicken but she would quickly realize it wasn't and stop. She never broke skin or caused me to bleed when she did that. Also now when she is most upset and huffy she will sometimes refuse to even eat chicken.


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## nikki (Aug 28, 2008)

There are some hedgehogs that just seem to be biters and don't settle down while being handled. I have taken in a few like this because their owners couldn't deal with it. I'm sorry I can't be of much more help but with my "biters" I just did my best to keep my fingers out of the way and anytime I forgot to do this they would remind me with a bite. I still held them and interacted with them but had to deal with the potential of being bit each time.


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