Hedgehog habitat

Every night for the past week or more the dogs go all hysterical out in the yard during for their pre-bedtime (and sometime middle of the night, in Oli's case) bathroom break. Apparently my yard is prime hedgehog habitat. They don't know quite what to make of the funny little creatures, but the general rule of thumb seems to be: when in doubt, surround the intruder and go into a barking frenzy.

Fortunately, so far neither dog has done this.

(Yes, that's an Australian shepherd--two actually. You can read more about them, and the hedgehog, and sheep, here.)

And since we're on the subject of wildlife habitat, I can report after a late afternoon stint of sawing wood that my woodpile is--or was--home to scorpions and spiders. Haven't encountered any snakes yet, but I often see specimens of Anguis fragilis when I'm mowing.

Update: After signing out of webmail and getting ready to shut down for the night, I scanned the headlines at siol.net and stumbled across this little news item from Serbia. For the benefit of non-Slovene speakers, here's a rough translation of the lede:

In Serbia, impotence treated with a hedgehog

Kragujevac - A 30-year-old man from the environs of Kragujevec, Serbia, has barely survived massive hemorrhaging from his penis after a local healer encouraged him to have sexual intercourse with a hedgehog.

I hope the hedgehog is all right.