Hedgehog Trivia
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50 free Hedgehog trivia questions with answers — nature quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
49 free Hedgehog trivia questions with answers. Hedgehogs top Britain's favourite-animal polls, star in Beatrix Potter books and a Sega franchise, and even lend their name to a gene that shapes your fingers. This hedgehog trivia quiz covers all of it: the biology (what the spines are made of, how cold a hibernating hedgehog gets, why they froth at the mouth and lick their own backs), the 17 wild species from the Sahara to Siberia, pet African pygmy hedgehogs, and the folklore that stretches from Pliny the Elder to Groundhog Day. The set runs from easy questions a child could answer (what is a baby hedgehog called?) to expert ones about anti-submarine weapons, Schopenhauer and Soviet animation. It suits a family quiz night, a classroom nature unit or anyone who has just adopted a hedgehog and wants to know more. Every answer was checked against a primary or encyclopaedic source before publishing, and each question carries a citation, so you can trust what you learn here.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01A hedgehog's spines are hollow hairs stiffened with which protein?
Keratin
Keratin, the same protein that forms human hair and fingernails, stiffens the hollow spines; unlike porcupine quills, hedgehog spines are not barbed and do not detach easily.
Q 02Roughly how many species of hedgehog exist in the wild?
17
About 17 species, spread across five genera, are recognised; the European hedgehog, Erinaceus europaeus, is the best known and the usual garden visitor in Britain.
Q 03Which continent has no native hedgehogs at all?
Australia
Australia has no native hedgehogs; the family is native to Europe, Asia and Africa, and there are no living species native to the Americas either. Introduced populations elsewhere tended to become pests.
Q 04What does a hedgehog do when it feels threatened?
Rolls into a tight spiny ball
It rolls into a tight spiny ball: a band of muscle around the body's edge pulls the loose skin shut like a drawstring bag, tucking the face, feet and belly inside.
Q 05What is a baby hedgehog called?
Hoglet
A hoglet: litters of around four or five are born blind and deaf in a nest of leaves, and the young begin foraging with their mother at about three to four weeks old.
Q 06When a hedgehog meets a strong new smell it chews the source and spreads what over its spines?
Frothy saliva
Frothy saliva: the hedgehog chews the substance into a foamy spit and licks it over its spines, a habit called self-anointing seen in hoglets as young as 15 days; scent camouflage and toxin defence are the leading theories.
Q 07In hibernation, how low can a hedgehog's body temperature fall from its usual 35 °C?
2-5 °C
As low as 2-5 °C, barely above freezing: a hibernating hedgehog's body temperature tracks its nest, and its heart slows from about 190 to around 20 beats per minute.
Q 08Hedgehogs share distant ancestry with which small mammals?
Shrews
Shrews: hedgehogs and shrews both belong to the order Eulipotyphla, which also includes moles; porcupines are rodents and only look similar.
Q 09How do gymnures, the hedgehog's closest relatives, differ from hedgehogs?
Ordinary fur, no spines
Gymnures, or moonrats, have ordinary fur, no spines; both groups belong to the family Erinaceidae, and the moonrat is known for a powerful smell from its scent glands.
Q 10Which old English word for hedgehog survives today as the name of a spiny sea creature?
Urchin
Sea urchins were once called sea hedgehogs. Hedgepig is another old name for the animal.
Q 11How long is the gestation period of the African pygmy hedgehog?
Around five weeks
Larger species can take up to 58 days. Litters of the smaller species tend to be bigger, five to six young.
Q 12How are a newborn hedgehog's quills arranged at birth so that the mother is not injured?
Hidden under a fluid-filled skin membrane
They are hidden under a fluid-filled skin membrane at birth; within hours the skin dries and shrinks and the quills emerge, and the first soft set is later replaced in a process called quilling.
Q 13A protein called erinacin gives hedgehogs some natural immunity to what?
Snake venom
Q 21The British Hedgehog Preservation Society set up Hedgehog Street in 2011 with which other charity?
People's Trust for Endangered Species
People's Trust for Endangered Species co-founded Hedgehog Street with the BHPS in 2011; the campaign recruits householders as Hedgehog Champions who link gardens with fence holes and log sightings on the BIG Hedgehog Map.
Q 22What job does Beatrix Potter's hedgehog Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle do?
Washerwoman
Washerwoman: Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle launders and irons the clothes of the local animals; the 1905 tale drew on Potter's pet hedgehog and Kitty MacDonald, a Scottish washerwoman, and Frederick Ashton danced the role in 1971.
Q 23The Tale of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle is set in which part of England?
Snake venom: erinacin in hedgehog muscle blocks the haemorrhagic effect of viper venom, and hedgehogs share a mutated nicotinic acetylcholine receptor with pigs, honey badgers and mongooses that resists neurotoxins, so they can eat adders.
Q 14In which US state is it illegal to keep a hedgehog as a pet?
California
California bans hedgehogs as pets under its exotic-animal rules, as do Georgia, Hawaii and Pennsylvania, along with New York City and Washington, D.C.
Q 15The African pygmy hedgehog, the usual pet species, is also known by what name describing its hind feet?
Four-toed
Four-toed hedgehog: Atelerix albiventris lacks the hallux, or big toe, on each hind foot, leaving four toes; it became a popular American pet in the 1980s.
Q 16To which country did colonists carry hedgehogs from Britain in the 1860s-90s, where they are now pests?
New Zealand
New Zealand: hedgehogs arrived from Britain in the 1870s to remind settlers of home and to control garden pests, and spread so fast that they became a threat to native insects, lizards and ground-nesting birds' eggs.
Q 17Which animal is the main predator of hedgehogs in Britain?
Badger
The badger: its long claws can prise open a rolled-up hedgehog, and hedgehog numbers are lower where badgers are dense, so hedgehogs tend to avoid areas where the two overlap.
Q 18Which fast-food dessert's UK lid was redesigned in 2006 after hedgehogs got their heads stuck?
McDonald's McFlurry
McDonald's McFlurry: after a British Hedgehog Preservation Society campaign, the UK lid's opening was narrowed in 2006 because hedgehogs drawn in by leftover ice cream could not back out past their spines.
Q 19Because hedgehogs are lactose intolerant, the RSPCA says you should never leave out which drink for them?
Milk
Milk: hedgehogs cannot digest lactose and it gives them diarrhoea, so the RSPCA advises meaty cat or dog food and a shallow dish of water instead; bread is also discouraged.
Q 20A 'Hedgehog Highway' is a square hole cut in a garden fence. How big should it be?
13 cm x 13 cm
That is about the size of a CD case, big enough for a hedgehog but too small for most pets. Hedgehogs can roam a mile or more a night looking for food and mates.
The Lake District
The Lake District: the Newlands Valley near Keswick, below Catbells, supplied the backgrounds, and the little girl Lucie was based on Lucie Carr, daughter of the local vicar.
Q 24Sonic the Hedgehog made his first playable appearance on the Sega Genesis in which year?
1991
1991: Sonic the Hedgehog launched on the Genesis in North America on 23 June 1991 and in Japan the following month, built as a faster mascot to take on Mario.
Q 25Sonic the Hedgehog's signature colour was chosen to match what?
Sega's logo
Sega's logo: designer Naoto Ohshima gave Sonic a blue coat to match Sega's cobalt-blue logo, and his first level, Green Hill Zone, became one of gaming's most recognisable settings.
Q 26Who voiced Sonic in the 2020 live-action Sonic the Hedgehog film and its sequels?
Ben Schwartz
Ben Schwartz, of Parks and Recreation, voiced Sonic in the 2020 film and its sequels; Jim Carrey played Dr. Robotnik, and fan backlash over Sonic's original design forced a costly redesign before release.
Q 27The 'hedgehog' gene, whose mutants sprout spiky bristles, was first discovered in which organism?
Fruit fly
Fruit fly: Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard and Eric Wieschaus found hedgehog in 1980 while screening Drosophila for genes that pattern the body; mutant larvae were covered in bristles, and the pair shared the 1995 Nobel Prize.
Q 28Besides Sonic, mammals' other two hedgehog genes are named after which kinds of hedgehog?
Desert and Indian
Desert and Indian hedgehog: the three mammalian genes are Sonic, Desert and Indian hedgehog; Sonic was named by postdoc Robert Riddle after his wife brought home a magazine advertising the video game.
Q 29Loss of Sonic hedgehog protein in an embryo can cause which condition, where the forebrain fails to divide?
Holoprosencephaly
Holoprosencephaly: without Sonic hedgehog signalling the forebrain fails to split into two hemispheres, and in the severest form, cyclopia, a single central eye develops; the same protein patterns limbs from the zone of polarizing activity.
Q 30Which philosopher devised the 'hedgehog's dilemma' of hedgehogs huddling for warmth?
Arthur Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer set out the parable in his 1851 Parerga and Paralipomena: hedgehogs huddle for warmth but prick each other, so they settle at a middle distance; Freud cited it in 1921.