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Hedgehog victory over fast food giant!

It has been a long hard battle, but the British Hedgehog Preservation Society is celebrating the news that McDonald’s have changed the lid on their McFlurry dessert!

The original containers trapped many hedgehogs, some were released by kindly passers by, some were found dead, and it will never be known how many were never found at all. The new lid has a smaller aperture so the customer will take the lid off to get to the ice cream. Even if the cup does get thrown to the floor with the lid attached, the hole should be too small for hedgehogs to push into.

A spokesperson from McDonalds said “In consultation with the BHPS, we have undertaken significant research and testing to develop new packaging for our McFlurry dessert that addresses this issue. We are delighted to announce that we have now introduced a new lid with a smaller aperture for our McFlurry dessert. The smaller aperture of the lid has been designed to prevent hedgehogs from entering the McFlurry container in the unfortunate incidence that a lid is littered and is then accessible to wildlife.

Our restaurants and packaging will continue to display anti-littering messaging to encourage our customers to dispose of their litter responsibly, and we conduct daily litter patrols whereby we collect not only McDonald's packaging but also any other litter that has been carelessly discarded.”

Fay Vass, Chief Executive of the Society said “This is excellent, if long overdue news! We have been in touch with McDonald’s about this problem for over five years, and are delighted that they have at last solved the problem. Thanks to public support of our campaign, from the 1^st September 2006 every McDonald’s restaurant in the UK will be using the new lids on their McFlurry cups and by doing so many hedgehog lives will be saved.”

Slug pellet confusion

Recently we have received letters and calls of concern from members and carers who have seen Bio Mini Slug Pellets advertised using pictures of hedgehogs. We are worried that people may think this means the pellets cannot harm hedgehogs. The pellets concerned made by PBI Homes & Gardens contain an ingredient called metaldehyde; we have post mortem reports of hedgehogs that have died from ingesting this chemical and believe that it does pose a threat to hedgehogs. We were approached by a representative of PBI Home & Gardens to endorse this product and refused because we believe the pellets pose a threat to hedgehogs. We explained this in our letter to the representative, enclosing copies of the aforementioned post mortem reports.

We, along with other concerned individuals and groups have written to the Advertising Standards Agency and Trading Standards voicing our fears. Letters have also been written to the stores where such promotions have been seen, and in response B&Q have said “The 'hedgehog friendly' claim made on the product packaging does not meet B&Q standards; hence B&Q will develop an action plan with our suppliers to delete this phrase from the packaging on a rolling programme.”

We believe it is always better to try alternative methods to poisons; slug numbers can be reduced using a beer trap (a yoghurt pot or similar filled with beer and sunk in ground) or half a grapefruit skin placed like a dome on the ground (slugs need removing daily). Even better, try to encourage the hedgehog, Mother Nature’s own slug controller, into your garden. Ensure there is a shallow dish of water available and perhaps offer some supplementary food such as meat based pet food or hedgehog food (available from the Hogalogue). You could also provide a home for hibernation and nesting, again we sell homes in the Hogalogue, or see our leaflet entitled ‘Hedgehog Homes’ on how to build your own.