Scottish hedgehogs saved after consciences pricked

0 Comments | AFP, February, 2007

LONDON (AFP) — A death sentence hanging over hedgehogs on a remote Scottish island was lifted, after conservationists agreed to end an annual cull that has become a prickly issue among animal welfare groups.

Hundreds of the creatures on Uist, in the north-west Outer Hebrides island chain, have been given lethal injections since 2003 because of the threat they pose to rare wading birds and their eggs.

But Scottish National Heritage (SNH), which has carried out the cull, unanimously agreed at a meeting Tuesday to end the practice and instead relocate the mammals to the Scottish mainland to be monitored.

"An agreement to go ahead with a trial translocation was reached," an SNH spokesman said.

The SNH had previously maintained that removing the hedgehogs...