Dear All,

I am sorry to bombard you with another update so swiftly on the heels of yesterday, but ... news came in that is too good to keep to myself.

You may remember a while back Jonathan Houseago from Thurston in Suffolk had been trying to get the developers working around his village to take onboard the idea of Hedgehog Highways. 

The first to respond was Linden Homes - now they are now part of the same group as Bovis and have taken on Hedgehog Highways - in fact the development will have around 100 holes cut into the fences. And he is still in communication with Hopkins Homes.

But it was Persimmon who were proving hard to reach - Jonathan was persistent - writing politely (and often!) - ignoring the knock-backs and finding new ways to approach them. 

When Persimmon wrote and said "As stated in my previous email, unfortunately with our site in Thurston, as the materials have been ordered and houses have already been sold we cannot make amendments to the fences," Jonathan suggested they have a meeting to discuss things in more detail. 

He kept pointing out that Linden were committing to help hedgehogs - and also making sure that the easy words Persimmon tossed his way were passed back with added spike. For example, Jonathan wrote, "As you said ... as a developer you take wildlife habitat seriously, may be you could qualify that by making provision for hedgehog highways?"  

It is easy for developers to say things. It takes us to make sure they do them!

And then yesterday - this letter came to Jonathan, "it has been decided that we will look to provide 75 hedgehog highways across our site in Thurston."

Add into this the response that came from the third developer, Hopkins Homes, they responded to Jonathan saying that they have decided to raise all the gates on the Thurston Park development to allow Hedgehogs to get underneath into the gardens.

This is amazing news - it shows the power that a vocal, persistent and polite individual has - especially when backed up by the weight of this petition. We can all help create this sort of change. So, please, when you see developments taking place in your patch, ask - there is no harm in asking. And keep a copy of the correspondence! You never know, I might need to be writing a load more updates like this if we keep at it!

Thank you to Jonathan - and to all of you. Maybe one day we won't need to make a fuss? Maybe one day developers will be treating wildlife with the care that it is due?

And finally - in the run up to the book launch on 10th September you are going to have to forgive me ... there is going to be a live Zoom event that day - I will post an invitation soon ... it will be restricted to the first 300 people though.

The book is now on special offer through the publishers ... you don't get it any cheaper, but if you add the code CHANGE into the coupon box at checkout, £1 goes to the British Hedgehog Preservation Society. If you can support a local bookshop - then please do ... here are some of my favourite local shops: Kenilworth Books, The Book House in Thame, oh - it will be better for you to have a look online and find your closest - but these will post copies to you.

Thank you - and hope you have a peaceful weekend (I write that as the trees behind my shed sound like a jet engine about to take off!)

Photograph by Nick Upton (featured in the new book).

And a final PS - the Facebook Group has just topped 10,000 members!!! Come and join the club - lovely bunch, sometimes a little strange - but in a good way!