One of the reasons I was so happy to accept the invitation to be a patron of Prickles and Paws Hedgehog Rescue down in Newquay, Cornwall, was their willingness to adopt and adapt technology.
Please pop over to the Substack version for more photos - and a chance to comment, thanks. There is no paywall, it is just a better platform than this one!
And now they have asked me to ask all of you for a little help.
Every hedgehog that comes into their care has its temperature checked. Monitoring this is vital when dealing with hypothermic hedgehogs and in assessing the effectiveness of treatment. Many rescues rely on the touch and experience of the carers.
The traditional way you would take get an accurate temperature is, how shall I best put this, rather intrusive, and also not something you can do when the hog is determinedly in a ball!
But - if you calibrate a thermal imaging camera carefully it is possible to get a very accurate reading just by pointing it at their face - the eye being the gateway. This technique was developed by Rescue Director, Katy South - and she published a peer-reviewed paper on it in 2020.
So - to the ask … all of this work has been done on a very old thermal imaging camera that is becoming increasingly unreliable. The one that best meets the needs of the rescue is the FLIR E54, but these cameras are eyewateringly expensive… at £5,100.
Already Prickles and Paws has received a grant of £1000 - and now, THIS FUNDRAISER through the Big Give - is doubling everything we can raise, meaning we ‘only’ need to get £2050 to reach the total.
The problem is that this is only open for a week - so PLEASE - give what you can and share like crazy!
In other news … who has been watching Young Sherlock on Amazon? I started because the early part of the show is set in Magdalen College, Oxford - a place I am VERY familiar with - having been their photographer for the last 12 years. I was pleasantly distracted - amused by the impossibility of some of the shots - opening one door and appearing somewhere completely different to the reality.
But what really kept me hooked was … the hedgehog! Did you see it? Perhaps unsurprisingly I seem to notice hedgehogs, and this was just a second or two - a fireplace, alight, with a carving at the back of it, of, a hedgehog … I rewound and took a photo … So, I kept watching with a hope that this would make a reappearance or maybe be a significant clue … but no … and really, that was not well-spent time!!
In other, other news - my garden has been giving me such pleasure - dandelions, wild garlic, and wisteria are just making my heart sing with joy as I walk down to my shed to start working!
In other, other, other news - I have a few talks coming up so if you are near Brill on 29th April ... come and say hi (a free event!). For the Cornwall Mammal Group on the 12th May - and for Devon Mammal Group on the 13th May!