Hi thanks so much for replying!!!
You bet
She is on taste of the wild cat food, the pet shop said that is what they feed all their hedgehogs.
I hadn't previously heard of that food, but it looks pretty good in terms of ingredients; ie, the first few ingredients on the list are a good source of nutrition rather than bad things like rice/grain/low quality meat byproducts. I'm assuming she's on either the
Canyon River or
Rocky Mountain feline formula?? I might add some to my mix... good call by the pet shop on that one! It's so rare to see shops doing something right.
The protein is a little high on the Rocky Mountain... which is fine for a healthy hog. However, long-time owners have cautioned against too high protein, noting problems with kidney function. As she grows out of her baby stage she'll likely need something with a lower fat percent than either of the two. But as a baby, looks great.
Not right now, but soon (like a couple weeks), I'd introduce a second kibble to her diet to go along with the first. The reason is: hedgies tend not to transition to new food very easily and if something goes wrong with her current kibble (eg, the company changes the formulation, there's a recall, she decides she doesn't like it anymore, you just ran out and the store doesn't have any in stock, etc...), then you have that second kibble as a back-up to carry her through. Also, since there's no "perfect" food for hedgies, a second food may be able to round things out for her... for example, choosing a second food with a bit lower fat % - maybe she only needs a few pieces of it as a baby to get used to it, but then change the ratio over to include more of the 2nd lower fat food as she grows up.
Also I read that she will have green poop for the first few days because of the stress of the new environment, but she's never had green poop.
Congrats! That may change; don't become alarmed if it does unless it doesn't change back.
Her wheel is the super pet comfort wheel. It's plastic, no wires.
Good choice. Check to see that it rotates freely and that it's easy to get into and out of (I think I recall I had a stand that put it up a bit high on one of those). Hedgies can be finicky about their wheels; for example, it might smell "wrong" - try rinsing it out a few times with plain water in case there's a funny scent to it. After dry, put a couple kibbles in there to lure her up at night. You'll know what's happened by morning depending on what happened to the kibbles. Check to see if it wobbles a bit funny -- like if the stand isn't flat to the floor.
Some hedgies have a problem with the plastic ridges that line the inside of that wheel. You could try lining it with craft foam to rule that factor in/out. Though, of store-bought wheels, you definitely got the best. The solid running surface is safest for hedgies (unlike the Silent Spinner which has dangerous gaps running down the centerline) and it tends to hold together well (others fall apart; land on hedgies, etc... If all else fails, you could try a Flying Saucer wheel (form pet store), making your own bucket-type wheel, or buying a bucket-type wheel from reputable makers.
Check the environment too. Some hedgies are such closet wheelers - make sure it's dark and quiet for hours on end. If those conditions aren't met, some will refuse to wheel.
But also consider, she's young... she may just need some time and space to figure it out.
--since I've only had her for a few days, I usually wake up when she does and I'm up till she goes back to sleep, I've never seen her touch her wheel at night. She usually gets up, poops, eats, bites on her water bottle for awhile, plays with her tube and then goes back to sleep
In addition to being poop machines, babies do sleep a lot. I once had my little girl fall asleep in my hands as she was walking from one to the next. She ended up with her little body curled around the side of one hand and her little face smushed into the palm of the other. And she slept like that for awhile -- she was too adorable for me to separate my hands.
She eats different amounts, sometimes she will eat her whole bowl and others she will eat about half at night then wake up during the day to eat the other half
That pattern sounds pretty normal to me... especially for a baby. I had one that would eat the majority and night, then come out for a snack around 5pm. Another one only eats at night.
As long as it's approximately the same amount over a 24-hour period (almost regardless of when within the 24 hours), that's good. You just really don't want her going a whole day with very little or nothing.
-- at the moment she is in a large plastic storage bin. It has holes drilled into the top but I mostly keep the top off. Should I still continue to up the heat in the house if I get her another source of heat? I am constantly checking her body heat to make sure she isn't cold.
If the thermostat is in another room than her cage, it can be hard to tell if she's at a nice consistent temp... for example, if the thermostat is near the middle of your house and she's closer to the outside, it's possible that her room is getting colder or fluctuating more than the center of your home. And, of course, unless you're in a consistently warm part of the world or have unlimited finances, it's going to get expensive keeping your whole house up to hedgie standards. Also, figure, if she gets ill, one of the first things you do is bump the temp up a degree or two... meaning your whole house has to go up a couple degrees. So I think I'd be looking at finding a way to control the temp that's more hedgie-specific.
With a plastic bin set-up, I'd aim to regulate the temp in whichever room she's in. I'd get a stand-alone space heater... not the small fire-trap kind, but something nice like an oil heater with a built-in thermostat.
I'm not really a fan of the under-cage heating pad idea. I like them as supplemental heat, but not as a primary heat source. The kind you could use with a plastic bin is the kind you'd get at a drug store (ie, wouldn't get so hot as to melt plastic)... but it's hard to set the temp "just right" and they have auto-shut offs so that you don't accidentally burn yourself.
Some folks have used mini-CHE's with plastic bins to heat the air. It's a system where you have a small ceramic heat emitter (CHE) bulb screwed into a small (less than 8" diameter) lamp that's rated to accept CHE's and is plugged into a thermostat controller. That system does a good job of keeping the temperature in the right zone while not heating your entire house up.
Another benefit to having a system that's more cage-specific (rather than a house- or room-level one) is you can travel with hedgie without asking your hosts to modify things to fit hedgie's needs.
