# Hedgehog suddenly ill and died- causes?



## khallesihedgie (Jun 13, 2014)

On Monday morning I noticed that my 1.5 year hedgehog hadn't eaten any food. Hercules loves food and always has an almost empty food bowl each morning. I woke him up and he seemed fine. He was very active and seemed normal. I gave him some scrambled eggs and he gobbled it right up. That night when we had play- time and he also seemed very normal. 

However on Tuesday I noticed that his new food bowl also wasn't touched. He hardly had any poop, it looked like he had some diarrhea. I tried giving him some scrambled egg again because he loves scrambled egg. He didn't want it so I put him back and was going to try again later. About 10 minutes later, he threw up. The first throw up was white in color and the next throw up looked greenish (but it was hard to tell because it was on a black sock). I took him out of his cage and he could barely walk. It looked like his back legs were fine and his front legs were the problem. He would just kind of shuffle/ slide. He was still pretty active and seemed relatively normal despite the trouble holding himself up. We took him to the animal hospital and the exotic pet vet was out so they just told me to just watch him overnight and to try to syringe feed him baby food. I woke up periodically around the night to try to syringe feed him baby food, but he wouldn't have it. 

Finally this morning, I took him out again and he was very lethargic and couldn't even lift his head up. He refused to eat or drink anything. He didn't even have the energy to huff. He also seemed cold despite being right under his heat lamp that has always been between 77-80 degrees. We immediately took him to the vet and he died on the way there. What do you think happened? I don't think it was a hibernation attempt because he had a Ceramic heat lamp and also was getting enough light. He wasn't even that old either.


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## Kalandra (Aug 25, 2008)

I'm sorry for your sudden loss. Unfortunately there are many things that could have happened and its impossible for any of us to tell. Best thing you can do is to ask a veterinarian to do a gross necropsy to see if they can determine the cause of death.


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