Poo Expert

I was very concerned last night because Rollo hadn't pooped since the car ride home from Susan's. He was eating and drinking, but no poo, and I knew that wasn't normal because hedgehogs are notorious for being somewhat prolific poopers- especially as babies. It's also normal for a stressed hedgehog to poo a lot.

I got up six or seven times during the night to poke around the internet looking for answers.

I learned 2 things
- Hedgehog owners are obsessed with poo
- Hedgehog owners are an entire community of poo experts

The poo obsession starts almost instantly and I am fast becoming a poo expert.

Hedgehogs are not terribly complicated to keep, but 90% of their ailments seem to be diagnosed via examining their poo. But my baby wasn't pooping.

Then it got worse.

Forum thread led to forum thread and by 3am I was crying because we'd done his heating wrong!
(And also because I'd had like 20 cumulative minutes of sleep. I would just lie there worrying about poo.)

The problem with a heat lamp is that it's a lamp.
It's too much light and because it has to be on all night so his pen doesn't cool off, Rollo would never know when night was because it would never get dark for him and his circadian rhythm would be all off and he wouldn't know when he was supposed to be up running around etc. etc. can lead to weakened immune system etc. etc. etc.

I was now doubly distraught.
WHY had none of my hedgehog books from the public library mentioned this!?
Oh right, they're all pre-1995.

So then I started researching ceramic heating elements, and periodically dozing off on the kitchen floor next to Rollo's pen.

I turned off his lamp around 7am while it was still very dark, but enough light for me to (sort) of see buy, and sure enough, he got up and started snuffling around. He took a couple (very long) drinks of water and ate some kibbles and pushed around his crinkle ball a little (he has a little green and gold crinkle ball cat toy Susan gave him before he left), then I had to turn his lamp back on because his thermometer was dropping and good little nocturnal monster that he is, he went back in his igloo and went back to sleep.

And still no poo.

When Rick woke up I, still distraught, explained to him that we were horrible ignorant inadvertent baby hedgehog abusers, and he told me to chill out, we'd remedy the situation as soon as PETCO opened, and then made fun of me for sleeping on the kitchen floor.

We got Rollo out for a morning rumpus and he had a kibble or two and crawled around on Rick for a while and then I got to be his human mountain (which is super fun, he tickles like crazy!)
Rollo worked his way up onto my shoulder and was attempting to use me as a landing pad from which to burrow into the love-seat and then the crook of my neck felt warm and wet and I was pretty sure he'd just peed on me, but then it smelled like cat food! And I got super excited and was all
"Rick! Rick! I think he pooped! Look! Look! Did he poop on me?!"
and Rick said "Yes. All over your neck. Don't move. I'll get you a towel." He returned with a paper towel and said "Wow. He pooped a lot."
and I responded with "Don't squish it! I need to see it!"
and Rick paused and looked at me a moment like I'd lost my mind, before carefully removing all the hedgehog feces from the crook of my neck and giving me the paper towel so I could examine the poo for myself.
And I babbled about all the things I'd learned about hedgehog poo in the last six hours... something along the lines of
"Oh! This is a great poop! See how it's soft but solid and there's no green! That's perfect! Hedgehogs have green bile in their tummies and when they get stressed it turns their poop green and sometimes runny, but sometimes stress can constipate them and make their poo really hard and cause blockages. And that's really bad too. But this poo is awesome!" (see? Poo Expert)
And Rick took the paper towel from me and removed Rollo, who through this entire exchange, had been trying to work different angles from which to burrow into the love-seat via my shoulder, and said "That's awesome. Why don't you go wash your neck."

Rick may have been less excited, but he was equally relieved to see Rollo defecate all over my neck.

We also, as Rick promised we would, remedied the heat/light situation by replacing the brooder lamp bulb with a ceramic heat emitter. We even got to keep the dome we originally purchased because the CHE works just like a brooder light bulb minus the light.

So now we just leave the kitchen light over Rollo's pen on from around 8am (when we leave for school) until about 8pm when we get him out to play and socialize.

Rollo seems to be settling in exceptionally well, and I'll feel a lot better after a few days when we really get him on a schedule and have a better idea of his food/water intake etc.
But I think, after four days of continuous research and design we're finally getting a handle on the optimal hedgehog habitat for our Rollo.