# Huff and puff without a reason?



## vasogoma (Feb 25, 2012)

I am not sure if I already did this question in the forum, I do remember making it on youtube and not getting a response. Anyway, yesterday during the night, as I was trying to fall asleep, I heard Agatha huffing. No one was near her and I was not making any kind of noises or movement, do hedgehogs tend to do that during the first days?


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## Rainy (Jul 27, 2011)

She's settling in to a new environment. It could have been a soft noise, or the heat or air kicking on, or a noise outside, or it could have been her imagination running away with her. She's still getting settled in her home. Unless she's showing other signs of illness, I wouldn't worry about it. Maybe she just told herself a very funny joke and she chuckled to herself.


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## vasogoma (Feb 25, 2012)

Yeah  I guess I just need to be a little less paranoid... I am a new mommy after all haha! But thanks a lot Rainy, and I loved the way you replied, it sure calmed me down, I even laughed with the last part.


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## Rainy (Jul 27, 2011)

Soon you'll know what normal is for her. I'm a bit paranoid with my little ones too. I always think to myself that my vet must think I'm a hypochondriac (but for my hedgies). But then I think.....how would I feel if this was serious and I did nothing, or worse, if I put it off and my hedgie suffers because of me?  That's a scary enough thought that I take them in. If she continues to huff for no apparent reason, repeatedly, and she is showing signs of distress like consistent nervous pacing, not eating, not drinking, not wheeling, not leaving her bed to go to the bathroom, not sleeping, etc.; then I would take her in for a vet visit.


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## vasogoma (Feb 25, 2012)

True, but yeah, it was something that happened once and for a very short time (seconds I guess) and she is acting very normal


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## moxieberry (Nov 30, 2011)

Random huffing can also be related to quilling. Archimedes was terrible about this, there were times when any little touch to his quills would set him into a little tizzy, because he'd huff and pop once, and doing that would brush him up against whatever it was (usually a blanket) which would make him do it again, and it'd be this little cycle of driving himself nuts. He likes to sleep in his dig box, which is full of fleece strips, and sometimes when we'd take him out we'd pull the strips off to wake him up, and the few little pieces still in there with him would be touching him and drive him crazy. XD When hedgehogs are being either grumpy or skittish (often the case because of getting used to a new environment or quilling), they very easily can have huffy reactions to things we aren't even aware of. Sometimes with Ares he would just be sleeping in his bag on my lap, everything quiet, me not moving at all, and it was like something that only existed to him would suddenly set him off. Weird little dude. He doesn't do this at all now that he got over his grumpy quilling phase.


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## vasogoma (Feb 25, 2012)

Interesting, and I think she might be near or during quilling, I've seen around 5 quills on the floor of the cage, is this quilling or they are only normal quills falling off?


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## moxieberry (Nov 30, 2011)

Considering her age, most likely she's quilling to some extent. It can be more obvious for some hedgehogs than others. For us it was really obvious from Ares' mood, and because we could see new quills poking in through his skin, but the greatest amount of quill loss happened toward the very end, when his mood started to get better. That hasn't quite tapered off yet, he's still shedding some baby quills, but he seems to be done with growing in new ones for the time being because he stopped being a complete terror. XD


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## vasogoma (Feb 25, 2012)

Aww I can only imagine how he was acting and I can't help but find it adorable 
Agatha is pretty friendly with me (didn't happen with most members of my family), even since the first time I saw her, I really can't imagine her being less friendly but when the time comes I will love her the same or even more 
Once again, thanks a lot for your replies!


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## moxieberry (Nov 30, 2011)

Yeah, some of them get the grumpy thing worse than others, but from what I can tell pretty much all of them will have some amount of moodiness from quilling. We met Ares twice before we brought him home, at 4.5 and 5.5 weeks (brought him home at just over 6 weeks) and he was a doll both times, and also fantastic and friendly when he came home. The grump kicked in around 7 weeks and got progressively worse, which was incredibly frustrating - but we knew it was just a phase they all go through, and we handled him for around 2 hours on average every day, though a lot of that would be just having him in his bag in my lap (and staying very still to not set him off, haha). Weeks 9 and 10 were the worst, and he hit his peak of nastiness actually less than a week before it suddenly just improved immensely, and then there were maybe 4-5 of it wearing off, and then it was completely around 11.5 weeks. He's now 13 weeks as of today (Friday) and he's so sweet, he almost puts my dog to shame - and she's a therapy dog named Sweetie, lol.


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## vasogoma (Feb 25, 2012)

That sounds very nice, I will be very patient when the time comes, specially now that I know what to expect. 
Yesterday during the night there was another weird noise she was making, but it was nothing from the range of noises they usually do, today I finally saw the source of the noise. It was her playing with her bowl of water. She couldn't really move it or anything, but it seems she enjoyed swimming and splashing all over the place. The noise was her nails against the aluminum bowl.
Except for fish, I've never had a pet inside my room (of course I am not counting the spare times my dogs have slept inside my house and also inside my room, they can be counted with two hands) so I am still getting used to a) noises in general and b) calming down and not being too paranoid about every single detail of my new baby.


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## ThePliny (Jun 3, 2010)

hedgehogs also dream when they sleep- sometimes they make quite a bit of noise, as if they were having a nightmare. Pliny has done this several times, he will start huffing like crazy in the middle of the night when he is asleep; when I lift his blanket up he just looks at me with a 'uh, what are you doing mom and why did you wake me up?' face.


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## vasogoma (Feb 25, 2012)

How adorable  Wouldn't it be nice to know what they dream about?
By the way, today she didn't do any kind of weird noise and she didn't even wake me up at all. I think she is settling pretty fast


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