"wild" hedgies and chins might run on wheels if provided in their natural habitat?!

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smhufflepuff

super-duper hedgiepig
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"wild" hedgies and chins might run on wheels if provided in their natural habitat?!

Hedgiedaddy ran into an interesting article: http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/281/1786/20140210.full

Small preview from the abstract: "Here, we show that when running wheels are placed in nature, they are frequently used by wild mice, also when no extrinsic reward is provided. Bout lengths of running wheel behaviour in the wild match those for captive mice."

And from the observations section: "Some animals seem to use the wheel unintentionally, but mice and some shrews, rats and frogs were seen to leave the wheel and then enter it again within minutes in order to continue wheel running."

Now we just need a few Europeans to put some wheels out in their gardens to see what happens with the hedgies!
 
Yeah, the frogs aspect really caught my attention. No idea that they would run (or hop) in a wheel.
 
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