Kiwi the Hedgehog

meet our new baby hedgehog Kiwi!! we've had her for a couple weeks now and she is the sweetest hedgehog ever. Jason originally planned on getting me one for my birthday in June but they were illegal in Arizona then so they were much more expensive and harder to find. we found a baby online in Denver that we were going to pick up on our road trip, but we changed our minds when we figured it would be difficult traveling with it. a few months after we got back though they became legal in Arizona and we started our hunt! we found a pet store that sold them but we had to be put on their waiting list. we only had to wait a couple weeks until they called to say they had more babies in. we chose Kiwi because she was the friendliest out of all of them. we picked up others and they would prickle up and stay in their ball (one was even shaking when we picked it up) but she came right out and didn't seem scared at all. she has been such a fun pet so far! 

 

we had a hard time thinking of a name for her so we spent a lot of the drive up to the cabin with Loretta, Ben and Madi coming up with names. we had a lot of good ones but decided on Kiwi because she resembles both the Kiwi bird, and the fruit! also, Kiwi birds are from New Zealand and they have hedgehogs in New Zealand (even though ours is an African Pygmy hedgehog). 

most hedgehogs roll into a ball when they are scared but shes rarely scared so she won't (only when she's sleeping). whenever we try and put her on her back so she'll roll she kicks trying to get up. in this picture she looks crazy trying to avoid it- ha!

 Tarley is obsessed with her and the first night we got Kiwi she kept whimpering all night in our room so she could go see her. Kiwi doesn't seem scared of Tarley at all which is great. Kiwi keeps trying to crawl underneath her to sleep and it pricks Tarley so she backs away.

I'm so glad we picked out a friendly hedgehog because some hedgehogs are naturally scared and grumpy so you have to work with them more. we try to hold her a lot so she'll be extra tame and not scared of anything. it's a good thing we're night owls since they are nocturnal and she usually isn't active until around 11pm. she loves to cuddle though when you are holding her during the day and she'll sleep in my sweatshirt hood or pocket. she makes the cutest little noises and is always sniffing since hedgehogs don't have very good vision. she is super sweet and an even better pet then we thought she would be!