Hedgie hates baths and nails clippings

[poppy2016]

Hi everyone! New to posting to the forums but Ive been a long time reader. I got a hedgehog about two months ago, I adopted an adult (roughly 6 months old at the time I adopted her) rather than buying a baby, so she took a little longer to acclimate to me/my apartment. She's warming up nicely now which is a relief.

However, she HATES baths. I don't give her them very often and when I do I fill my large kitchen sink with only about an inch of water and put a fleece blanket along the bottom of the sink for her to walk around on. I've had to give her more foot baths recently as she's been pooping on her wheel and the poop gets stuck under her nails. I lower her in slowly and make sure the water is warm but not hot. She's calm at first but then slowly begins to FREAK OUT. Nothing will calm her down, not even a little treat. She pees and poops in the water and then when I take her out and wrap her in a towel she is the biggest grump for hours after.

Her nails are also getting longer, and while i've never even cut the quick or made her bleed, she despises it. I started out using the small animal nail clippers the breeder gave me but found that they were so large and clunky I couldn't clip her nails well. She hisses when I touch her feet, and will stress pee on me almost every time. Ive tried cutting her nails in the bath, cutting them with her held in a blanket against me, and tried to give her a little treat between every paw I clip. I just don't want to traumatize her and make her a less than friendly hedgie because of it!

[chloere93]

Hey there
I usually bath my hedgehog once a month and he doesn't really like it either, so I just make it as quick as possible. He seems to like me brushing his belly with a small soft toothbrush though which soothes him a bit in the bath. I also find this is the best opportunity to clip his nails because he doesn't curl when wet. I use human fingernail clippers as I feel they're more accurate and safer to use (imo) because they're small. Hold him flat on your palm with your fingers slightly splayed open, when your hedgie puts a leg through, try to gently hold the limb between your fingers and just cut the very tips of his nails. It might just take a lot of time and patience. Give a treat after successfully clipping a few nails, it might relate to something good that way some hedgehogs just have a more grumpy nature, mine certainly does sometimes takes me 20mins to get all his nails!

[nikki]

Most hedgehogs hate water. What you can do when he just needs his feet cleaned is put a wet facecloth or piece of fleece in the sink, no extra water, and let him walk on it and get his feet clean that way.

[poppy2016]

Thank you both so much! I will definitely try the palm nail clipping method, and try some human nail clippers as they are more accurate. I'm mostly worried about traumatizing her but I think with lots of patience she will be fine!

I'm going to try the wet fleece or washcloth in the sink too. Especially since she's been getting daily "poop boots" now.

[nikki]

I actually think nail clipping is more traumatizing to us than it is to them. LOL

[TangledRivers]

I haven't found a single trick that works for mine. She's not really grumpy, but she's so petrified of everything that even moving makes her curl up. She will walk around quite a bit once she sees I'm not going to eat her alive, but if you try to grab her paw in any such way to clip it, she'll curl up again. Of course, hates baths and that doesn't help her really relax any at all. She also can't be scruffed as a last resort. I'm so dismayed about her nails. I thought it was a pain in the bottom to trim my cat's nails! Lol!

[Pixel101]

Yeah my hedgehog hates bath so much. Though my previous hedgehog LOVED BATHS. We had got him from another owner not a breeder so he told us to wash him once a week so he got his fair share of bath time. Then when we got Pixel the breeder corrected us on a couple things.

[jessicalynn]

Originally Posted by nikki

Most hedgehogs hate water. What you can do when he just needs his feet cleaned is put a wet facecloth or piece of fleece in the sink, no extra water, and let him walk on it and get his feet clean that way.

That's a great idea. My hedgie hates water, I'll have to do this tomorrow morning. He needs daily foot baths after the marathon he runs every night. Thanks for the tip!