The children used him as a soccer ball and he would surely have died, in excruciating suffering, if the hedgehog Johnny had not been saved and taken managed by a clinic.
The story comes from Bolzano: luckily one person realized that the ball was actually a poor animal and took it to the Südtirol Exotic Vets where it was constantly assisted. When the vets took care of him, Johnny had an area of his back that was abraded and without spines, which however - specifies the clinic in a note - will grow back over time.
"Initially Johnny was really very small, so we had to prepare a classic diet plan every four hours, even at night, until a satisfactory weight was reached," explains Dr. Stefano Nuovo. «To this we have added a deworming cycle with antiparasitic treatments because curls are always rather subject to this kind of problem. Thanks to the fundamental help of the volunteers, we were able to bring him to a good state of health in the right time, allowing him to proceed to the next step before being released into the wild".
Now Johnny, thanks to the interest of a Crab volunteer, has a small corner of the garden at his disposal on private land in Oltrisarco, a stone's throw from the woods. "When he knows how to move safely in the wooded environment he will be ready to face his life fully," Announcing New Year. In about ten days, in fact, the hedgehog will be released into the wild.
(Unioneonline/D)
